A/N: This one isn't as long as the first, but it's tense. I'm trying to pace things appropriately so that everything doesn't happen too quickly, but also so you guys aren't bored with filler chapters. The less filler I have the better. Thanks to everyone who reviewed last chapter, especially cardemon, who's been especially helpful when it comes to establishing my OC ;) Please review and let me know what you think!
Chapter II
It took Olivia a few attempts to get her eyes open. Having no windows in her room, there was no sunlight to wake her up. When she did manage to open her eyes, her eyelids felt heavy with exhaustion the need for more sleep. But incessant knocking on her door prevented her from burrowing her head and falling catatonic again. Instead, she forced herself out of bed and walked over to the door, already having a hunch as to who it could be.
She was fairly surprised to see Dwight behind her door, and not Negan.
"Boss says up and at 'em, sunshine. Time to put you to work." He pushed into her room without waiting for an invite and dropped his tall frame into the chair Negan sat in the night before. He folded his long fingers into a steeple in front of his face. "I'm to escort you to breakfast and then to the munitions yard for training."
Olivia pursed her lips. "Very well. Let me change."
She did so quickly. The pants were slightly too large, but the belt help drastically. The top fit loosely, which Olivia was slightly grateful for. Pulling her hair back, she placed her Dodgers cap on her head and pulled her hair through the loop in the back. The boots fit perfectly and she laced them up tightly.
"Shall we?" she asked, as she emerged from the bathroom. Dwight followed her out.
"Did you sleep well?" he asked her as they walked down the hallway to the stairwell. Olivia glanced sideways at him. He seemed nice enough, and he was the reason she was even here.
"Like the dead," she replied, and a small smile made his mouth turn upwards.
"That's how it was for me, when I first came to the Sanctuary."
"How long have you been here?" They took the stairwell down to the first floor, and instead of heading towards the double doors where Matthew died, they went the other way. Her new boots squeaked on the clean tile floor.
Dwight sighed and tucked a lock of his hair behind his ear. "Lost count. I was one of the first people Negan took in though. Me and…my wife." His gaze fell.
"Oh, I'm…sorry. Did she die before or after...?"
Dwight swung his head to her, giving her a good view of that ugly scar. "Oh, Sherry, she… She's not dead. She's, well, I guess it doesn't matter." He ran a hand over his hair and Olivia narrowed her eyes slightly. Ultimately she decided it was none of her business, and so she let it go.
They exited the building and turned the corner, into a large yard. Folding tables had been set up and ammunition had been laid out. Spare magazines, cleaner, bullets, not to mention the numerous guns of all kinds – assault rifles, revolvers, handguns, shotguns, hunting rifles. Men and women alike were cleaning and disassembling them, then reassembling them in quick succession.
"Where did you find them all?" Olivia murmured. Dwight looked over at her and smirked.
"Negan. We follow him, and he takes care of us. Now, the way this works is, each person is assigned a job. Depending on how well you do your job, you have the chance to rack up points. Get enough points and you can trade them in for an extra ration of food, medication, whatever you need. You do a good job, you earn points. You don't do a good job, you lose them."
Tit-for-fucking-tat.
Dwight stood across the table from her and picked up an M4, stared at it a moment, and then tossed it to Olivia, who had to throw her arms out quickly in order to catch it.
"Let's see what you got, new girl. Take it apart," he said.
Olivia stared at the weapon in her hands with a bit of uncertainty, turning it over in her hands. She at least had the common sense to switch the safety to on. Then she let her hands explore the weapon and within moments had figured out enough of it to pull the gun apart. She laid the pieces on the table for Dwight's inspection.
"Not bad," came another voice instead. Olivia and Dwight looked towards the source as Negan stepped out from around the corner, Lucille resting on his shoulder. He had that nearly-permanent smirk on his face and no trace of his anger from the night before was anywhere to be found. He sidled up to the two of them as everyone around them obediently dropped to their knees. "Now, put it back together. Double time."
Olivia swallowed and picked up one of the pieces, easily fitting it back to where it belonged. She stumbled a couple times on the smaller pieces and Negan leaned his head closer to her to watch her, his eyes crinkling with amusement. Finally, Olivia set the reassembled gun on the table.
He tsked, "We're gonna have to fix that, sweetheart. Can't fucking fight back if you can't get your fucking gun assembled, can you?"
Olivia met his stare evenly. "It's been a while since I've had to take an assault rifle apart."
"Which reminds me," Negan circled her, dropping Lucille to his side to swing her absently, "where did you fucking learn how to take apart a fucking M4?"
She pursed her lips, looking down at the weapon on the table. "My dad was a gun fanatic. Kept quite the collection. He taught me everything I know about munitions. He had a couple of these puppies locked away in a safe, and he wouldn't let me touch them until I was eighteen."
Negan hummed. "Doesn't sound like a half bad guy. Speed that shit up, doll." With that, he swung Lucille back onto her perch on his shoulder and strode away. Everyone, aside from Dwight and Olivia, got up off their knees and resumed his or her business.
Dwight raised his eyebrows at her. "That's about the best compliment you're gonna get from him until you can do it in the time it takes him to blink."
"Shouldn't be too hard."
"Boss said you'd chosen medical too. Med school?" Olivia nodded and Dwight whistled low. "Impressive. Tell you what, today, you'll work here," he called to a larger man, who seemed to have the personality of a teddy bear and came stomping over, "under Griffin. He'll direct you more on what happens here. Griff, Olivia, new girl."
Griffin smiled the kind of grin that lit up his entire face. When he spoke, his voice was deep, but Olivia found in it an odd sense of comfort. "Shouldn't be too hard to get her set up. Right this way, little lady."
Dwight began to walk backwards to handle his own affairs. "I'll come find you for dinner at six. Enjoy your day, Liv."
Olivia gave a small wave and then turned her full attention to Griffin as he ran down the schedule for the ammunitions workers.
Her arms were sore by the time Dwight met up with her for dinner. Much of the day consisted of her moving arms and ammunition from crates to tables to trucks and back again, with practice assembling and disassembling a variety of guns. The men had a supply run coming up and all weapons needed to be emptied, cleaned, and reloaded and then loaded up into the toolboxes that were to be brought on the run. Griffin was impressed with her attention to detail and her assurance that each weapon would be flawless should it need to be used. Griff had assured her that very rarely did they resort to guns; if there were any roamers that needed dispatching, they tended to use melee weapons to reduce the chances of drawing more.
She wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. Her baseball cap had helped to keep the brunt of the summer sun off her face, but it was still hot as all hell and her new clothes clung to her frame, drenched in sweat. Dwight was waiting by the entrance into the building, leaning against the bricks with his eyes to the ground. His head snapped as he heard her approach.
"Shit, you look like hell," he commented with a lopsided smile. Olivia tugged her shirt away from her body to allow for at least some ventilation.
"Not used to working in the sun like this. It's rough. Thinking a quick dinner, a shower, and then lights out." They stepped into the coolness of the building.
"It does take some getting used to, but everyone pulls their weight around here. I don't think it went completely unnoticed that you definitely did." He jerked his chin and Olivia followed his gaze to see Negan striding down the hall, with that arrogant swagger he possessed, a grin splitting his face.
"Glad to see the newbie made it through day one," he said, his voice echoing down the empty hallway.
"Griff says she's taken a shine to ammunitions," Dwight quipped. Negan turn an approving eye to her and slapped a large hand onto her slim shoulder.
"That's what I like to fucking hear. Y'know, I watched you a bit out there, dollface. Keep up the fucking good work and maybe I'll consider taking you out on runs."
Olivia was mildly surprise and briefly let it show on her face to Negan's delight. "Really? Well, thanks. Uh, well, if you'll both excuse me I have a meeting with the shower and the food court." With a nod of approval from Negan, she ducked away and to the stairwell.
Over the next week, Olivia bounced between munitions training and manning the medical ward with Dr. Carson; since injuries were at an all-time low, to her relief, Dr. Carson spent free time with her showing her how to inventory medical supplies and medication. The Saviors kept a strict chart of who had what condition and who received what medication and when. The medications were locked away in a storage cabinet and only Dr. Carson and Negan himself held the only two keys.
Speaking of the leader of the Saviors, he'd been favoring spending time with Olivia whenever he could. He seemed to be fond of overlooking the daily chores throughout his compound overall, but he spent quite a bit of his time watching Olivia as she packed weapons for future supply runs or observed Dr. Carson giving a patient a physical exam. He'd stand outside the exam room and watch her, her brow furrowed in concentration as Dr. Carson demonstrated and then promptly had her try it hands-on. Olivia might have said it bothered her, but she wasn't completely confident in that assessment. To be frank, she wasn't confident in how she felt about Negan in general. He had his good days and his bad days; he was hot and cold, one day smiling and cursing up a storm, the next he had a glare that could put Sasquatch six feet under. Fortunately, Olivia had managed to keep herself off his bad side since that first night at the Sanctuary and she'd refused to have dinner with him.
Olivia found herself settling in quite nicely into Sanctuary life. She'd made sort-of friends out of Dwight and Griffin and often ate dinner and spent free time with them. They never divulged personal information of 'Before', and for that she was thankful. She'd learned to cope and move on and block out the painful things she'd experienced, pushed them so far out of her mind that she wasn't sure she'd completely remember details. She learned more about Dwight's former wife, Sherry, and the fate she'd met. When Dwight first told her, her first thought had been, 'I'd rather be dead'. She couldn't imagine spending her days locked away inside, forced into skimpy lingerie, and throwing herself at a man who fully believed he was the king of the new world order.
Dwight justified it by telling her that Negan took really good care of his wives, and if she was lucky, that she might have the opportunity to become one.
"I've seen the way he looks at you," he'd said one evening over dinner. Olivia allowed one corner of her mouth to lift.
"Oh yeah? And how's that?"
"Like a tiger who's locked onto his prey."
Olivia hesitated and then muttered, "That's comforting."
"I mean it, Liv. And if he comes to you, you'd do best to say yes. He takes real good care of them, but he won't force you if you say no. He ain't that kind of man."
Olivia hummed, pretending to think it over. The last thing she wanted to think about in this new world was whether her leader wanted to get into her pants.
"Well, time will tell, I guess."
Olivia saw her first medical emergency the next day. While out on patrol, one of Negan's men had stupidly gotten himself into a hairy situation with some roamers and dove through a hole in a chain-link fence and sliced up his thigh in the process. He'd been carried in by four other men, and Negan was hot on their heels, demanding to know how one man could be so fucking careless.
Dr. Carson and Olivia jumped into action, throwing rubber gloves on to protect the man from any chance of infection. Carson picked up the surgical scissors and cut away the man's jeans. The gash was located on the inside of his thigh, and how he'd even managed to accomplish such an injury was beyond her. But she focused on her work, stepping in when blood rushed from the veins in his legs and Carson hesitated. The din in the room was distracting, especially with Negan yelling insults and criticism, his booming voice overpowering everyone else in the room.
She felt a head rush coming on and, before she had one more moment to think, bellowed, "Everybody shut the fuck up!"
The room stilled immediately, the only sounds coming from the man on the table as he writhed in pain. The sheets he lay on were soaked through with rich red blood. Olivia hadn't needed to look up as she felt one set of eyes on her in particular, burning holes into her forehead. She risked a glance up and saw Negan, standing above everyone else, with a terrifying glare in his eyes.
Heaving out a breath, she held up her gloved hands, also soaked with blood. "I need everyone to go. Carson and I can't concentrate. Now we're going to do everything we can to save his life, but I need everyone to clear out of here, right now."
There was a moment's hesitation, and then Negan's booming voice again, yelling, "You heard her! Everyone fucking out!" She'd never seen people move faster, and the room was quickly emptied. Only Negan stayed behind and Olivia almost decided against saying what she did next.
"You too, Negan." Carson froze, his eyes moving from one person to the other, and he took a visible step backwards to give them room. Negan's eyes darkened as his temper flared and Olivia held up her hands again. "Carson and I can't do our jobs well enough if we can't move around the table. And, you know, you're kind of a big guy." She was worried her attempt at humor wouldn't succeed and waited with bated breath.
Negan read her well though and he blew his temper out with a heavy sigh. His shoulders sagged as he cast a forlorn look at his comrade on the table, set his jaw, and looked at her again.
"Save him. Otherwise it's your ass." The threat rang loud and clear, and it was all Olivia could do to nod. Negan turned his large frame and stomped out the door and down the hallway, people dodging out of the way as he walked off his rage.
The drywall bit into his knuckles as his fist collided with the wall of his office, but he'd barely felt the impact through his ire. Just who the fuck was she to order him around? Granted, the room had been small but what kind of leader was he if he didn't see his men through each of their ordeals? Especially if one of their lives were on the line? He paced in front of the bookshelf, irritated with himself. He'd obeyed her, for Christ's sake. Why had he done such a stupid fucking thing? He had to punish her somehow, make her realize the error she'd made.
He'd have to save it for later. Right now, she was busy saving that man's life. Feeling only slightly calmer, he walked out of his office and made his way back down to the medical wing. Olivia was leaning against the wall outside the exam room, staring at the tile floor. She looked up when she heard his boots and he didn't miss the small reflection of fear on her features. She quickly masked it, though, and instead plastered a look of sympathy on her face. He hadn't made it.
A few of the Saviors were standing by, waiting to speak with Olivia. They snapped to attention when Negan jerked his chin in a "come here" motion, gathered around him and Olivia.
"Stupid fuck didn't make it," he said coarsely, causing Olivia's eyes to furrow. "Get the body, put him on the fence." Nodding, the men entered the exam room and emerged a moment later with the now dead man's body.
When they returned, and received no further orders from Negan, he turned his rage to her. She'd inhaled rapidly, and then his hand was clamped around the back of her neck, pulling her down the hallway in the direction from which his men had just come.
"Let's you and me have a little chat." His voice was far from jovial, and apprehension set into Olivia's body.
He shoved her into the sunlight and against the railing overlooking a yard she hadn't yet seen. Her eyes scanned the property, and the numerous roamers ambling around tied to chains and impaled on poles.
"This is what happens to the people who no longer have any use for me." He angled his face close to hers, his hand still tight around her neck as he forced her forward, over the railing. His jaw was clenched, the muscle dancing beneath the skin. Olivia felt a surge of fear, an icy shot through her veins. Her knuckles gripped the railing until they turned white. Negan's body was pressed up against hers, pressing her further into the rail until she thought she might bruise. He kept her trapped, with the one hand on her neck, and his other blocking her way out on the other side.
"This is what happens when people step out of line and don't do their jobs. You failed today, Olivia." Dread settled in her stomach as she suddenly recognized the man she'd attempted to save—only now, he was a roamer on a chain, snarling and gargling and ambling along the fence. "You didn't do your job, and that's a problem for me. I lost a man—sort of. But that means less people on supply runs. That means less of everything for everyone. How am I supposed to lead a colony if I can't spare the men to find supplies? Hm? How?"
"I don't know," her voice was strangled, and not because his hand was around her neck. She licked her lips as Negan pressed her harder against the railing, making her wince.
"Not only did you fail at saving my man, you had the nerve to order me around in front of my men. Now what happens if someone else decides to try the same thing? What if someone else decides to stand with him? I'll be facing a riot. See, I can't have that because that's a real fucking inconvenience for me. For that, you need to be punished. Do you want to work the fence with them? Hm? I'm sure we can find a place for you out there. Or maybe…" The hand at the back of her neck moved around to her throat and as he squeezed he jerked her head back, forcing her to stare upwards into his face. His other arm wound tightly around her waist, again squeezing until she was short of breath. His fingers dug into her skin and she tried, and reined, to rein in her panic as her air supply was cut short.
They stood like that for a while—it seemed like eons to Olivia, as she wriggled against him in an attempt to break free. She squeezed her eyes shut, forcing herself not to cry out of fear. She felt herself getting lightheaded, felt the blood rushing to her face as Negan stared down at her with a fury she'd never seen. His jaw was clenched so tightly she wondered if he'd end up cracking his teeth. Right as black spots danced across her vision, Negan pulled his hands away and broke away from her. She sucked in a breath, dropping to her knees as blood returned to her body. She panted, felt herself trembling with fear, and coughed at the sudden rush of air back into her lungs.
"Do not disappoint me again," were Negan's parting words as he left her on the concrete, struggling to breath. Her fingers clasped her throat tenderly; she winced, positive there would be bruises there in the morning.
When she'd regained her breath and most of her composure, she shakily rose to her full height and went back inside and up to her room. She passed Dwight in the stairwell and he immediately took notice of her glassy eyes and red throat. He frowned in sympathy.
"He's got rules and it's everyone's duty to abide by them. Don't cover up the bruises. He'll punish you again," was all he said before he continued on his way down the stairs.
