Author's Note: Oh boy. It's been a bit, longer than intended.

Thanks all for coming back to this! It's been over a year now since I kicked this thing off and I have so much more planned (and hopefully, more frequent updates!) and as always from the bottom of my heart - we wouldn't have a story if I didn't have an audience. You guys are what keep me coming back to this, what pushes me to work on this even when things aren't so great. Ya'll are the best 3

Mac is the one who wakes her. At least the sound of his voice is enough, feels like he's towing her out of the fog. It doesn't all come back to her at once. The only thing she can really focus on, that takes over everything, is the pulsing pain in the back of her skull. The pain is all to familiar and not the first time she had felt it in the past few days. This time, she doesn't wake up tied to a hospital bed. No. She's in a cell.

As soon as that realization hits her the rest of the blanks are filled in almost immediately. Hilltop, the van, putting a knife to Eric's throat. The way they'd fucking looked at her. Out of instinct her hand slides down her back, between the thin of her shirt and the cool concrete walls. Her fingers curl around air. There's no sheath on her belt. There isn't even a belt to speak of. Her jacket's gone, as are her boots. Someone had searched her, taken her things. Which meant she was unarmed.

Mac was in a similar state of undress. Jacket gone, no boots. No gun, no sheaths. Nothing so far as she could see. Mac isn't alone, and because of that she's quick to return her hand to her lap and let her eyes shut. She's got no interest in talking and if she were awake someone might just take it as an invitation. Mac could handle the social aspect, he always did.

Beth listens silently from her corner. Mac's singing, then he's talking. Or more accurately: he's being a prick to whoever is on the other side of their cage. There's one sole point where she genuinely considers getting up, and it's when she hears the yelling. Someone calling out to Rick - the asshole who had locked them up she thinks ruefully. The voice is familiar. Whoever Mac is antagonizing must leave because he returns to her side and slips his arm behind her back. She damn near pulls away but he's pulling her own arm over his midsection, spreading her hand flat over his hip.

It's for show, sort of. She'd heard him say wife. It wasn't the first time and if they lived through this, it wouldn't be the last. Apparently physical closeness made the lie more realistic. It's not just that though, there's more. She can feel something long and hard. Immediately she understands. It's like in one of those games that Haley plays on the laptop back at the outpost. It's a holdout weapon, she's pretty sure that's what they're called. Internally, she feels herself bristling. It doesn't feel fair that he gets the weapon when she had been stripped of hers. She's faster between the two of them, and hand to hand was her specialty. Of course, she isn't the one who gets the knife.

She doesn't hear their captor leave, but she figures they're alone because Mac's talking. Whispering really, right into her ear in the way that she absolutely hates. Beth has to ball her fists to keep from driving her knuckles into his crotch.

"They're seeing ghosts." No shit, Beth thinks to herself. "You've got them shaken up - not just because she were going to slit that guys throat. That's our ticket out of here alive. If you can just not try to kill someone for five minutes, we might be able to get back."

Oh, if it wasn't for facade of sleep that she was trying to keep up, she would have growled. She's never done it without a reason, killed someone. What she had done to Eric had been justified completely. They had Haley somewhere in one of their picturesque houses and Rick had the audacity to screw with them - to deny them even after they returned one of his alive and relatively unharmed. He had been a means to an end, the same purpose his death would have served if it had come down to it.

She had never killed without a reason.

—-

More come. The footsteps and whispering may as well have been a gunshot going off in their little cell, still she willed her eyes to stay shut. It's Rick, a few other people. Only one voice she really recognizes and it's the woman from the kingdom, that she's absolutely sure of. The one who had shown up at the cottage, the one she had almost shot. No one wakes them up or tries to speak with them. They just stand there and talk about them.

The woman being there was interesting. She was from the Kingdom, but from what she could hear, she spoke like she knew Rick personally and well. There was no mention of Haley or morning executions. Nothing to demand her immediate attention - what she was giving was already exhausting enough. For the time being they were safe. As safe as they could be at the hands and mercy of a man who had mercilessly slaughtered dozens of their people anyways.

The next time she hears voices, light is coming through the small window at the top of the cell. Mac is slumped against her, fast asleep. The woman is on the other side of the bars, standing there with her arms crossed over top of her chest. "How are you feeling?"

Beth blinks, and groans as she brings a hand up to wipe the remnants of sleep out of her eyes. She doesn't bother to give the woman a response. She's locked up in a cage like some animal, sleeping on a cold cement floor. Someone had knocked her out - she sure as fuck had seen better days. She doesn't press the issue, but Rick does."Can you walk?" Rick opts for another line of questioning all together. Beth tries her best not to snort. Of course she could walk. The fact that he was asking, that he almost sounded like he cared was laughable. At first she has no intention of entertaining him, doesn't really see why he needs an answer anyway. That is until he mentions Haley. Doesn't call her Haley, just 'the girl'. They can go see the girl now.

Hell yes she can walk. In fact they look surprised by how fast she springs to her feet.

Haley's alive. Haley's alive and unscathed, sitting at a kitchen table bent over a bowl and focused on shoveling the contents into her mouth at a worrying speed. Habits, if you didn't eat fast you didn't eat period. Haley doesn't seem to notice them at all. That's a little annoying, all the time they've spent working on her basic survival skills clearly, had been for nothing. In less than a day all her hard work had been undone. She looks way too comfortable.

Where humans often failed her, Beth found solace in the one thing she always could. Sadie. The flew out from underneath the table, very nearly knocking over a chair in the process. There's a flurry of fur and claws flying at her, an appropriate reaction she thinks. At least one of them is happy to see her. Haley can see them now, and she's smiling, but in no rush whatsoever to get up. She's clearly awake, Beth considers pinching herself for the briefest moment. It could be a dream - that could be why Haley seems perfectly content to be a captive in Alexandria. A captive of the man who had slaughtered an entire outpost. In case she had doubted her consciousness, Sadie is quick to remedy the problem as she nips at her hand, desperately trying to get her attention with a series of playful bits and high pitched barks.

"You're here!" Haley's quick to sign as she finally lifts herself out of her chair.

Of course they're here. Where the hell else would they be? To be fair, she supposes Mac is a surprise. Since she had more or less told him that he'd died. That had been a shock to her, too. Still she should have expected her. In a million years - she never would have willingly left the damn kid behind.

There's a small crowd gathered outside the door. Carol, Eric, and two others were crowded onto the front stoop, staring anxiously. Beyond them, Rick and the woman with the sword stood watch.

Mac gathers Haley up in a bear hug that looks like it has to hurt, but neither complain. Sadie is content to dance around the three of them. She doesn't move to embrace the girl. Not yet. Something still isn't right, and it should be. They'd brought them to the house - Rick had brought them to Haley and still it felt like a trap was about to slam shut.

She steps around the two of them, taking a mental inventory of what is set out on the table. A bowl half filled with oatmeal, which didn't look like much more than dog puke to her. Her sketchbook was laid out on the table, pencils strewn around it. She'd made herself at home. That wasn't a good sign, no way in hell should that have happened. She knew better. Why hadn't she gotten thrown in a cage like they had? Where was her gun? Her knives? Her belt, save for Sadie's leash, was noticeably absent. They must have taken them, just like they'd stripped her.

"Where's your bag?" Beth turns slowly, crossing her arms over top of her chest. "You should get your things. We're leaving." She doesn't see much sense in signing that, since just asking where the bag was has Haley's full attention. Her brow creases in a furrow as she looks towards the door. Haley only stares blankly. "Get your bag. Now." This time, she signs it.

"Tell them you don't want to stay." Beth plants her hands on her hips, voice firm. Haley mirrors her stance. She can see the defiance in her eyes. They won't let them drag her out, Rick had made that very clear. There's a small army waiting just outside the house to make sure that very thing didn't happen. They've got shit to do. Like leave, get as far away from Rick as they possibly can. The woman's there and she knows - she knows. She knows that they're Negan, the three of them. The others don't as far as she can tell. The give away being that they were still alive. That they hadn't been taken out of the cell and marched to the site of their seemingly inevitable executions. They needed to leave before the tides turned against them.

"It's safe here." And it's that silent declaration that causes her to go wide-eyed. In what goddamn universe was Alexandria safe for them? "They're people. Like you always said, they aren't monsters. They won't hurt me." That has her eyes flickering towards the doorway, where Carol and of the others stood watching the proceedings silently.

They're people, everyone in Alexandria. Everyone who aligned themselves with a Rick - they were as much born from flesh and blood as she was. It's disturbing how eager she is to stay. Where were the alarms bells going off in her head? Were there no blinding signs flashing 'danger' over and over again right before her eyes? The first thing she had ever taught Haley had been not to trust. The first goddamn rule of survival: You can't trust anyone.

It wasn't a perfect rule and like all rules it had its own exceptions. Over time and once they earned it, if they did, some could be trusted - deemed worthy. She had been within the walls of Alexandria for a day, almost two. Yet there she was painting the place with a rose colored brush.

Beth reaches out for her, fingers closing hard around her forearm. "Now, Haley." She whispers the warning as she pulls on her. Haley jerks, flailing as if she'd been hit. Beth Doesn't need to look to see that the trio who had been hanging in the doorway had moved into the house at the first sign of trouble. That was what it was, wasn't it? Trouble.

"You can't make me leave." Oh the hell she couldn't.

With each passing second Beth could feel the swell of emotion building inside of her. Anger, confusion, mostly anger. "There's nothing there for me anymore."

"You have a job!" It's Mac who finally decides to break his silence. Up until that point,it had been like he hadn't even been there at all. Haley's attention, and glare both quickly shift towards him. A job. What had her job been again? The children, that was it. Haley had spent every waking moment around the children. She'd slept in their quarters, taught them (as best she could, with the help of others - namely Luann) bathed them. She was the mother to dozens of children ranging from toddlers to pre-teens. Haley wasn't asking it but Beth could sense it. Everything about the way her eyes were narrowed at Mac posed the question flawlessly.

What job? They took the children. To the Hilltop and Kingdom colonies, they had taken them away. That fact that's hanging in the air in front of them - that they had rendered Haley useless in the eyes of the others in a few short hours seemed to break something then. Haley's no longer quiet.

"I wanted to go with you!" No. This isn't happening. They aren't having this conversation. Not here, not anywhere. "You didn't give me a choice." Haley's right, they hadn't. Hadn't asked if she wanted to go, hell they'd taken a few other kids about her age. The ones who survived were sitting in the lap of luxury in the Kingdom. There was almost nobody left, Haley would be one of the youngest at Gavin's outpost - at any of the outposts now. "I wanted to go!"

It dawns on her then. How stupid could she be. There hadn't been signs of a struggle because there hadn't been a struggle. How do you kidnap someone who chooses to go willingly? She'd thought that Rick was making it up – he had to be.

In the blink of an eye she's in front of the girl, arm thrown back and hand raised. The blow never hits, it doesn't get a chance to because Mac grabs her wrist and wrenches her backwards before she can slap her. Still Haley reels back as if she had been struck anyways, anticipating the blow.

'I knew you'd find me.'

She'd done it on purpose. In the back of her mind she can hear something whisper to her. I get it now. When those people had rolled up to the gas station she had gone to them - she had surrendered willingly, asked to be brought back. Asked to be taken away. "What was I supposed to do? Wait to die with you?" The girl's signing furiously, and choking out the words as she goes just in case her point isn't being carried enough by one language, she opts for two. Broken as it sounds. Beth can just barely understand either. "If we survived – what about me? Do I wait until I'm old enough to go back? So he can make me an offer? He'll take care of me and I won't have to work as long as I'm his?"

She can't. Fuck, her head is spinning. It's too much. This is all too much. Beth lunges again but this time Mac's arms lock around her midsection. She may be fast, but he's faster just this once. That doesn't stop her from trying to kick anyways. There's a sudden flurry of legs and boots that are desperately trying to land a blow, accompanied by a snarl that would make any wild thing proud. It's out of instinct that she tried to strike again, an attempt to silence the noise that's landing as blows. "We wouldn't have let it happen!"

"You don't say no to him. No one does. You know as soon as I turned eighteen he'd make the offer. You know it!"

"We-"

"You know what he would do if you tried to stop him. It wouldn't matter if you did stop him. They would all be the same."

They're all Negan.

Haley doesn't say that, she doesn't sign it but Beth can hear the words echo in her mind regardless. It doesn't need to be said. That's what she's getting at. She's a beautiful young woman who just so happened to have a hearing aid. Something that most people would assume would put her at a disadvantage. Wasn't right, wasn't decent, but that's the way the world was now. People would look at her and see someone useless - if she was lucky maybe someone would take pity on her and take her under their wing. Look after her, keep her point balance clean. She'd be a target, an easy mark. Because she would need someone wouldn't she? If Negan didn't take her as a bride in a couple of years, someone else would try to.

The room is considerably more crowded now. The group outside had flooded the area. Some look panicked, others confused. "What the hell's going on?" It's Rick who is barking at them now, a voice that Beth finds impossible to ignore.

"One of yours for one of mine." She tries to jerk away from Mac, whirling her head around to face the other man. "That was the deal." There's an instance where Rick looks lost, just a fraction of a second.

"We never made a deal." That's got to be bullshit, right? Isn't that some sort of unwritten rule these days? Trades like that? People, supplies? Doesn't matter what. "The girl's making it very clear that she doesn't want to leave." Who the fuck cares? Beth wants to yell out. She wasn't his girl, one of his people. Why the fuck did he care? Carol's sidled up to Haley, placing a hand on the girls shoulder. The girl who isn't trying to hide the fact that she's crying a goddamn river, she's actually shaking.

"She belongs with us. You don't have a claim on her." Beth snarls.

Haley can't handle words anymore, her hands are moving at a pace that once again she can't keep up with. "What's she saying?" Rick looks to her, then Mac. It's Carol who answers.

"She'll die." She looks down at Haley, as if asking for confirmation. "If she leaves she'll die."

Oh, she's had enough of this. They've protected her this far - why did she suddenly think they'd fail her now? Beth finally manages to wrench free. Why hell did she think she was safer here? When all of the Saviors were looking to burn Alexandria to the fucking ground. She is, apparently the only person who isn't falling for the tears.

"You can stay, too."

It's simple, quick. Nothing before or after. It's a last ditch effort - if she gets them to stay then she doesn't have to leave, does she? Beth takes a step forward and everyone in the room tenses, from the corner of her eye she can see Rick and the rest twitch in anticipation, ready to jump in if need be. They can't stay. They won't be welcome here, not as soon as they find out who they really are. Beth doesn't think, she just acts. "It doesn't work that way." It's cold, calm. Something she has to force out from deep down. Her hand shoots out and wraps around Haley's forearm, jerking her forward as Carol's fingers dig into the girls shoulder as if trying to hold her in place.

Haley moves too. The free arm, the one that Beth isn't holding with a death grip. There's a flash of silver. She doesn't need to glance down because she can feel the cool metal pressed against her throat. Haley's not crying anymore, she's not pleading. She's staring at her wordlessly. In any other situation - she might have been proud. Where the hell had she gotten a knife from? How had she hidden it? Her reaction time was almost impressive.

Any other time.

It feels like she may as well have stabbed her. Like the knife blade didn't stop short on the delicate skin of her throat. Beth can't control the sick rage that's rising up like bile. How dare she . How fucking dare she pull a knife on her. It's exactly the wrong thing to say but Christ, she can't help it. "Go ahead. Do it. Over my dead body are you staying here." It's a dare, plain and simple. She won't do it. Haley's never killed before, not another person. It's a harsh reality that she's shielded her from, putting it off as long as possible. She's gutsy - but she's not gutsy enough.

"Haley, put it down." Mac's pleading, like he thinks she could actually slide that blade across her throat.

"No!" Any other time, she might have been proud.

"That's enough!" A hand reaches out and snatches Haley's and the knife away, and Mac once again takes a hold on her. Now she can focus on the others in the room. How the wild looking man is between them now, how Carol's grabbing the knife out of Haley's hands, how Rick's looking at her like she's absolutely insane. At least someone is in her corner, Beth thinks to herself as she feels Sadie brush against her legs. There's something comforting about the low growl that's cutting through the rest of the noise as Rick enters her line of sight. "No one's going anywhere. "Carol, take her upstairs." If there was ever a time to fight this would be it. Instead, Haley goes willingly without so much as another word, sign or otherwise.

It's smart. It really is. The knife, the outburst. Saying that she'll die. She's got to look desperate, if she looks desperate then maybe they'll let her stay, So far from where she's standing it's working.

"You're going back to the cell." Rick grabs her, and Beth tries to shake him off but his fingers tighten to a painful degree. The other guy, the one with the crossbow grabs Mac. Beth only manages one look as they're escorted through the door, for all she knows it could be the last time that she ever sees Haley. Maybe it's a good thing that the girl turns around to look at her then, too. The last thing she'll ever see is that little smile. It's small and sad but it's there. She'd won, she'd gotten her way. No way in hell are they gonna let them take her now. Not a goddamn chance after that display, the fact that she'd almost been willing to kill if it meant getting to stay. At least that's probably what they'd taken from that display.

Yeah, any other time she might have been proud.

A/N: I apologize if this was a rough one to read. I was really, really excited to finally have an update for you. I just wanted to get it out there!

This is a big one plot wise. Dare I say huge. We find out that Haley willingly went with Aaron and Carl, taking the gamble that they were from Alexandria. She's doing what she was taught - looking out for herself because sometimes you just can't trust other people to do it. She's terrified and Beth very clearly wasn't about to do anything about it. If Beth cared, why the hell wouldn't she have moved Haley to either of the other colonies with the rest of the kids? Yeah. This is one of those scenes that NEEDED to happen, overly dramatic as it was. It's important for Beth's story, and it really cements Haley as more of a main character which I've always intended for her.

I know some people are gonna have some thoughts on this, and I know ya'll were hoping for some Beth and Daryl interaction. I PROMISE you that's coming!

As always thank you for reading. If you drop me a comment or hit that kudos button, you're the best.

I'll see you all soon!