Hi guys! I just wanted to thank all of you guys for the awesome reviews, it means a lot to me that you like the story! Sorry I'm a little late, I was having a problem uploading, but I figured it out. Anyways sorry if the buildup for some answers is getting annoying but I wanted to establish a few things in the characters first, but I promise answers are coming about Beth. So hopefully you decide to stick with it! Next chapter will contain a major flashback that will explain some things, but there will definitely be a few more flashbacks throughout the next chapters. Please continue to be awesome and let me know what you think!

Chapter 4

"Maggie." Enid abruptly pushed the door of Maggie's office open, out of breath as she had just ran up three flights of stairs.

The group was all standing around, talking about the topic that had been in every person at Hilltop's mind since that afternoon. The man that the young girl called Jesus was in the center and had obviously just been speaking based on his stance when she had busted in. Enid figured he was trying to come up with some solution or at least an explanation for the pregnant girl. She knew that the girl was Maggie's sister and she had been with Negan, but Enid had not even been told a name yet.

Maggie instantly saw the concern of the girl's face as she caught her breathe while awkwardly leaning on the door knob, half scared to come in the room.

Maggie's face turned stern as Rick spoke to the teenage girl. "What is it, Enid?" Rick spoke quickly, but clearly.

"The girl" Enid stated. "Outside" She mumbled as Maggie pushed past her to the hallway. The group all followed, running down the flights of stairs and basically emptied hallways without thinking about why they were so.

Maggie ran through the house as quickly as she could, half terrified of what she would find at the end of her journey. She pushed the door open with the others directly next to her and felt the warm summer night air embrace her willingly. It was only a few feet down the dirt path that was rubbing off on her brown boots that the apparent crowd had formed. Maggie and the group began pushing through them until they began to move willingly to make a path for them only to reveal Beth on the ground with the woman, who had claimed Beth had killed her son just a few hours earlier, standing above her. The group sprinted to them just as the heavy woman with a brown bob of hair similar to Maggie's pushed her fist into the girl's face for a blow, that was seemingly not her first.

"Get the hell off her!" Maggie screamed as she made it to them.

Paul and Morgan pulled the woman off and got her on the ground a few feet away from Beth, who had just made it to a crouched position after the blow sent her down on the dirt.

"Jesus Christ, what the hell happened?" Maggie started to reach out to her sister. "Are you okay Bethy? Are you hurt?"

The group watched as Maggie carefully placed her hand to Beth's face, trying to lift it in order to inspect it. Beth jerked away quickly sending herself stumbling back a few steps as she pushed away and onto her feet. Maggie jumped in shock at the sudden movement.

"Beth" Maggie called, standing herself and walking towards where her sister had taken refuge from Maggie's grip.

Daryl watched her lift her face to the surrounding group showing her right eye, swollen and bruised to the point where it was unable to open. Her whole face was swollen and bruised, but her expression was pure terror in a severity that he had never seen before. Maggie took another step towards her in the moonlight, as Michonne and Rick followed in her lead to inclose around the already surrounded girl.

"Don't!" Beth suddenly revealed the knife she had in her left palm. The blade had obviously been pressed against her palm a while as she turned it around to point it at her sister, revealing her hand covered in her own blood. "Don't touch me!" She screeched as Maggie reached out to her before she pulled the knife and half swung it at Maggie. Maggie leaped back in confusion and fear, as Rick neared the two sisters slowly.

"O-okay Beth. It's okay, no ones touching. Just put the knife down." Rick reasoned as the Maggie backed up slowly in tears.

Beth was sobbing and shaking as she still held the knife up, turning slightly to point it at Rick now. "Please, please don't! Help me-ee! Please! Somebody help!" She sobbed and turned from Rick to her right, facing part of the surrounding crowd.

"Beth, no ones hurting you. It's Rick, you're with Maggie." He tried to calm her, putting his arms up in a motion of peace. "Do you know who I am?"

Beth hysterically sobbed as Daryl watched her back shake and shudder with every ripening screech from the girl.

"Don't! Stop!" She turned back to Rick, but her eyes were a million miles away.

Daryl stepped forward as she sobbed and threatened to stab the man in front of her.

"Beth!" Maggie screamed from a few feet back.

"Get away from me! Don't touch me!" Beth screeched with an ear piercing pitch.

"Beth." Daryl spoke calmly as he approached the sobbing girl, going closer than Rick had dared. "Beth, 's Daryl."

"Daryl!" Rick said in an angry whisper, not wanting to alarm the girl anymore.

"'S Daryl, Beth. Ya know me." He said reaching out to her.

"Please! Somebody help! Daryl! Help!" She screamed to herself.

Daryl grabbed her wrist tight enough so that she couldn't move her hand as she tried to slash him.

"Drop it." He said, calmly. "'S Daryl. Ain't no one hurtin' you. I got ya." He made her look at him in the moonlight as she fought to escape his grip.

"Let go of me… please… let-" Beth's voice slowly softened as Daryl refused to let her move.

"'S me Beth." He said to her softly, ignoring Maggie crying behind him and the hundreds of stares he was receiving.

"Da-Da-Daryl?" She stuttered in question.

"'S me."

"You didn't come!" She screamed again and he pulled her against his chest as the sterling silver dropped to the ground. "You-you're too late! You didn't…"

She screamed into his chest as he held her as tightly as he could, feeling tears and slobber against his lightweight shirt. He tried to stabilize her as every word sent a stuttering sob through her body making her heave and lunge.

"I got ya." He said softly.

"You didn't… you didn't… You-" Daryl felt her body go limp against his as his eyes traced the needle syringed into her arm up to Siddiq holding the other end. Daryl scooped the rest of her body up once she had fallen into a sleeping sedated state. He looked at Rick with the girl in his arms in question.

Maggie was crying to Carol as she watched the scene play out in front of her and was in no state to give orders. Rick looked just as dumbfounded as everyone else.

"I should check her blood pressure, make sure the baby's okay." Siddiq interrupted the moment.

"You should." Rick nodded. "The medical RV." He looked to Daryl, intending for him to carry the girl.

Daryl grunted and once more pushed past an array of people to one of the first few Rv's stationed. Siddiq led the way as Rick walked back a few steps to Maggie. She had collapsed on the floor crying with Carol and Michonne comforting her.

"C'mon." Rick pulled her off the floor and half hugged her as he forced her to follow Daryl.

Rick knew it wasn't good for her people to see her like this, but it was the least of his concerns at that point. He glanced once more at Jesus, who was with the sobbing woman that had attacked Beth.

"Put her in the pin." He instructed.

Paul nodded, but didn't move his stance next to the collapsed woman letting out hollowing sobs.

Rick ran his hands through his hair in stress, trying not to think of the ongoing war with Negan while dealing with the severe internal problems. He carefully guided Maggie into the medical trailer and helped her sit on the closest chair before looking around.

Daryl was kneeling down besides the white bed Beth was laying on, looking completely limp and lifeless, holding her bleeding hand with a look Rick had never seen before in him. Carol and Michonne followed him in and looked around as Siddiq pulled Beth's T-shirt up to where her breasts would begin. Rick eyed the scar under her ribs on her right side, but looked away in discomfort.

Carol walked to the other side of the bed, carefully dodging the ultrasound machine that Siddiq was setting up.

"Rosita and Tara are sorting things out, out there." Carol nodded towards the sealed door.

Siddiq gracefully pushed a needle in her arm and took it out, only to quickly toss it on his side table. The walls of the room were white, too white in Daryl's opinion, but it was supposed to mock a hospital. Carol's hand pushed through the still slightly moist hairs that had once more began to resemble tangled curls on Beth's head. She sighed and pulled her hand back, knowing Siddiq needed her to move.

Carol walked back over to Daryl's side and proceeded to run her hand through his own messy hair. He didn't make an attempt to move her, but hardly acknowledged her as Siddiq rubbed the tail of his machine on the girl's stomach. There was so much more fear and uncertainty in the room than there was earlier as the fetus's heartbeat filled the silent room.

"She looks healthy." Siddiq told Rick about the unborn child.

"And her?" Rick nodded to Beth, lying with her bloody fingers entwined with Daryl's as Carol tried to comfort him.

"Her blood pressure is dangerously high, so I gave her something to bring it down, but if it rises like that again we'll have to deliver." Siddiq explained. "I'll stitch her hand if you'll…" He said nodding to the girl's hand that Daryl was holding tightly.

Daryl grunted his approval and carefully lifted the girl's hand down to the white bed she was laying on top off, instantly staining it with redness. Carol leaned down and kissed the top of his head in comfort, but he instantly pulled away. She knew he didn't like public displays of affection, or most kinds of affection at all, but thought that day might be an exception. However he seemed more disagreeable with it as he roughly jerked away from her and walked back a few steps to lean against the wall.

Maggie was still sniffing as she wiped her face with a tissue Michonne had passed her. The group watched quietly as Siddiq ran a needle through the girl's palm and wrapped it in a bandage when he was done.

"The sedative should wear off in a few hours. She'll be awake in the morning." He said, heading towards the door.

"Wait." Rick ordered from the chair he was sitting on in the opposite corner from the exit of the trailer. "What the hell was that?" He interrogated.

"I…I don't know." Siddiq answered honestly. "Some type of PTSD, a panic attack of some sort maybe, I'm guessing."

"Thank you." Maggie mumbled as he made his way out the door, only for Jesus to appear in again.

Daryl thought back to their earlier conversation in Maggie's office, everything he learned still burned in his mind, although Jesus had not got to finish.

"So what the hell Jesus? Wanna tell us why she just got the crap beat out of her again?" Rick yelled.

"Okay." Jesus sighed. "They called her Mrs. Negan. It's not her real name, but they make fun of her."

"Beth." Maggie spoke, wiping the last of her tears away. "Her name is Beth."

"She was like his general or something I don't know much, but they came here."

Rosita walked in making them all turn to the door as Jesus was interrupted. Tara followed her in and Enid appeared behind the two.

"Sarah's in the pin." Rosita mumbled.

"Who?" Carol asked.

"The woman whose son was murdered by her." Rosita nodded to the girl, hooked up to monitoring machines that continuously beeped.

"We don't know that." Rick interjected, not liking Rosita speaking of the girl he viewed as half a daughter to him.

"Well..." Jesus said.

"See." Rosita rolled her eyes. Daryl expected Maggie to correct her in some way, but she just sat there, still letting her anxiety take over her face.

"You say one more goddamn thing about 'er-" Daryl started as anger built up inside of him.

"Daryl!" Carol warned, harshly stopping him before he did something she knew he would regret.

"Jesus, just tell us what happened." Michonne ordered.

"Wait nah. It ain't right. She gotta tell us." Daryl mumbled. "This ain't right." Daryl stood abruptly from the chair next to Beth's bed. "I gotta go." He grumbled.

"Daryl." Carol said, already seeing the signs of him shutting her and everything else out.

Daryl ignored her, but stopped when he saw Maggie out of the corner of his eyes, looking more distraught and worried than he had ever seen her.

He put his arm on her shoulder as he opened the trailer door. "Yer baby sista's gonna be just fine. We ain't gonna let nothin' happen to 'er. She's 'ere now. All that matta's."

Maggie smiled as she looked up at him, only for him to disappear out the door, slamming it closed again in an angry grumble.

Carol rubbed her forehead in stress, knowing she had to go try and deal with him in a few minutes. "Just go on Jesus." She mumbled.

"No, he's right. We should let Beth tell us. We can just wait to ask in the morning." Maggie spoke up.

"Alright then." Rick nodded in agreement.

Maggie weakly moved across the room to take Daryl's seat next to Beth. Her eyes traced her sister's body, studying the scars and imperfections in a guilty curiosity. How? The word swarmed her mind in a never ending, yet brilliant curiosity.

"I should go after him." Carol said, pushing off the wall she was standing against.

"You should." Rick agreed, knowing if anyone was to talk Daryl it would only be Carol that had a chance of getting through to him.

Carol pushed the door opened letting in the fresh warm air to the small space. She sighed, being engulfed by the darkness as she closed the camper door. Carol shut the door and instantly felt a guilty relief, being away from the stress of one place, only for other fears to take its place.

She walked through the open area, her eyes searching the sleeping bodies outside. Her mind wandered to getting back to Alexandria and the Kingdom, where all the people would have rooms and beds of their own. She thought of her last time in Alexandria, but sadness ran through like and icy blow as she pictured Carl. It had only been a day since she heard the news, but they had all been so consumed with Beth showing up that the reality hardly hit them. She almost thought it was better that way, at least until Negan was gone.

Carol looked around the center of the yard, but Daryl was nowhere in sight. Carol thought about where he was, but then her mind quickly went to what she wanted to say to him when she found him. Carol knew he was going through something and knew she could help him, but she wanted him for her own reasons. Carol herself wanted to be comforted and for a quick second wished it was Daryl searching for her in the middle of some summer night.

Carol walked to the back of the house, thinking it was a pointless effort, but was proven wrong when she found the brutting man sitting by the edged up pantry doors. He leaned against the wall, being hidden by the concrete stump that the two metal doors rested against. Carol approached him slowly as he twirled a blood stained knife around in his hands that were covered in the same dried crimson liquid.

"Hey." Carol said softly. "I've been looking for you." She slowly came up next to him and leaned against the wall that he was sitting against.

Daryl didn't acknowledge her, but kept his eyes on the knife. His mind was consumed with the thought of it as he felt dried residues prickling against his skin. He had Beth's blood on him.

"Why'd you run off?" Carol sat beside him.

Daryl just grunted and shrugged.

"Okay…" She thought for a second about where to go from there. "You know, you can't be feeling guilty when we don't even know what's going on." She came up with a moment later.

Daryl grunted. He only felt the blood on the knife, rusting it from its perfect sterling. Daryl felt the plain handle and remembered Beth trying to stab him. It pained him, not as if he was hurt by it, but seeing her so distraught made his blood boil in ways he couldn't explain. His shirt was still wet with her tears, he still felt her struggling impression against him, and he didn't want his questions to be answered as much as he did.

Carol rubbed his arm, but he was purposely ignoring her. He felt her turn to him and hold his neck in her soft palms, but he pulled back instantly. Daryl wanted her to go, but didn't say so. He held his tongue, hoping she'd leave him soon to be haunted alone with lingering ideas that made him want to bash every wall down until his body refused to push any further. But he couldn't; Daryl sat and held the knife of a girl. That's all he did, that's all he could do, while she struggled in ways he could never understand.

Carol then pushed her lips until Daryl's, feeling the awkwardness, but never enjoying it more. Daryl snapped his head back. "The hell are ya doin?" He yelled, not meaning to hurt her, but being completely in shock at her actions. Carol just shrugged and leaned towards him again.

"Life's too short." She whispered, and Daryl let her stand in front of him for a moment, while his thoughts ran to Beth once more.

He would try to push the thoughts from his mind, only to see his hands and feel her blood. It was all too real and the only person he wanted comfort from, the person who he thought of everytime he needed to comfort himself had just had a psychotic breakdown in his arms. But that's when he realized it.

Beth had been in his arms. He had wanted nothing more in the past two years than to hold her and protect her from every bad thing in the world to the point where he had to say Beth is dead over and over again to remind himself that it was too late; he had failed and she was gone.

But then she wasn't and he was holding her again, but he couldn't fight off anything that had attacked her. She screamed at intangible fears, only reminding Daryl that she had lived on her own and he wasn't there to save her. He had left her, thinking she was dead and gone forever, but then she was standing there. And he couldn't help.

Carol bit into his lips again even after his rejection. He didn't make an effort to push her off until she pulled away, but let his lips stay pressed as she forced hers on him. He felt the knife drop to the ground, out of his grip, just leaving behind the cold feel off the metal in his hand. The silver relived the same trip to the soil ground as it had hours earlier when he had forced Beth to drop it. Forced Beth, the words left a displeasuring emphasis in his head as he thought about it. He had forced her to do something; whether or not he had or choice, the fact was he had still made her drop the knife. He wanted to give her everything she could ever want, but he couldn't turn back time and so he had to force her to do something.

Carol's tongue grazed the inside of his mouth, but he hardly felt it. For a second he closed his eyes and thought of Beth. Not the struggled scarred girl lying sedated a few yards away from him, but the girl who had sang to him, the girl who still had hope when she had nothing else, the girl who had been taken from him and took his hope with her. And with the thought he realized that he didn't want to be kissing Carol, but wanted to sit by Beth's bedside, conscious or sedated, broken or hopeful. He wanted to see her face and be able to watch her as if she had never left him.

Carol pulled off him only to thrust open the steel pantry doors and take a step into the darkness. She felt half silly, sneaking around in the dark with Daryl, but the thought only intrigued her more. Carol squeezed his knuckles with dried scars from his day staining them with her own hand and pulled him into the darkness of the pantry.

Daryl let her lead him a few steps before he snapped his arm back. She had taken the first few steps into the pantry, that him and Maggie had hidden in a few weeks earlier, before he made his protest. He didn't want to hurt Carol, but his mind was consumed in a million other things over sex.

"Nah." He said blankly and stepped back into the moonlight. Carol followed him out only to see he had picked the knife off the dirt ground.

"What Pookie?" She ran her hand on his scruffy chin.

Daryl's thoughts shot back to Beth's hand there hours earlier and it only made his longing for her worsen. He didn't care about kissing her as Carol kissed him, hell the thought hadn't crossed his mind yet from when he had first laid eyes on her, he just wanted to be near Beth.

"Ain't in the mood." He mumbled, suddenly wondering what his brother would say to him in the moment.

"Okay." Carol pushed her hand through his greasy tangled hair once more before taking a few steps away. "You should get some rest Daryl, big day tomorrow."

Daryl smirked at her. "Ya should too." He mumbled.

"I'm gonna check on Maggie and Beth. See you there in a bit?" She asked.

Daryl grunted again and she left him to be engulfed into his torturing tendencies once alone again. Daryl let her return to the camper for a few minutes before he followed in her foot prints.

Carol pushed in the camper again only to find Maggie sleeping with her head against Beth's bed, but her body still in one of the chairs. She smirked and looked to see some of the others had fallen asleep too.

"Daryl okay?" Rick asked.

"Who knows with that man?" Carol smirked. "He will be, we all will be. Always are."

"Hell, we lose so many, and now we finally get one back. Should be celebrating." Michonne half laughed to the room, ignoring the side effects of her comment.

The door busted open a few seconds later and Daryl threw himself down in an empty chair in the corner of the room.

"We'll get some answers in the morning, figure out what we're dealing with." Rick mumbled.

"Finish this with Negan, kill him for whatever he did to her." Michonne added, looking at the girl.

"And for what he did to us." Rosita said.

Rick grunted this time, not responding in words.

And so the group sat or slept in a confused state, not knowing whether to just be grateful or utterly concerned. No one said anything for a few hours as people began drifting off to light sleeps. No one said anything; there was nothing to say until the fuzzy sound from Rick's walkie talkie blared into the room, interrupting the only other sound of light snores and the beeping of a heart monitor representing the effect of two heartbeats.

Rick jerked up in alertness as he reached into his jeans pocket to grip the plastic object with his right hand. He pulled it up as the others watched in anticipation.

"Rick." The voice was quickened with the radio waves and sounded muttered, but it was clear enough at that moment to everyone in the room, sending a feeling of anger or dread deep in their guts.

Maggie lifted her head in shock from a deep sleep, slowly coming into realization of where she was. She looked around quickly to see Daryl sitting next to her with his eyes lifted to Rick. Sweat creased her forehead and she looked down at the blonde girl with the memories of the previous hours rushing back to her as she studied the impression she had left on her sister's arm from leaning against it in her sleep. It took her another few seconds to realize Negan's voice had just stripped the trailer's safety feeling into a tense claustrophobic trap filled of anger and fear.

"Pick up asshole." Negan's voice continued.

Rick stared at the button he knew he would have to press in a few seconds as the first beams of the new day's sunrise beamed into the room. Rosita's eyes narrowed in on him, feeling her blood boil in her veins in an angered sense of helplessness.

Daryl's eyes once more glanced over the blonde girl, watching her stomach rise with every breath and anxiously waiting for her eyelids to break open to the room, so he could prove to himself once more that Beth Greene was alive in front of him.

"You've gone too fucking far this time, you little shit."

So yeah... I decided to try and have Carol somewhat want Daryl romantically, just to add another plot into the story. But this is in no way a Caryl story! Fully Bethly, so don't stop reading if you didn't like that part, because there won't really be any more Caryl support. I hoped you liked it but please leave a review. Sorry for the cliff hanger lol, I just couldn't find another spot to end it.

Thank you!