I tried but I couldn't think of a title for this one.

Premise: A/U take on Beth's kidnapping so AU after 4.13. This scene just showed up in my head and the plot bunnies just went from there.

Genre: Horror/Suspense

After leaving Joe's group, Daryl settled into hermit mode. He still possessed hope of Beth being alive but he had no track to follow and it was killing him knowing that he could spend all of his life searching for her and failing.

But Daryl Dixon never knew when to quit. It was Sophia all over again, he feared.

All of that changed one afternoon as he sat against a tree near his breaking point. A man appeared before him in priest clothing. "Good day, sir. Have you heard the word of Jesus Christ today?"

Daryl immediately pounced on him grabbing him by the collar. A religious man. The funeral home. The cross on the car that took Beth. It all had to be connected. This had to be the guy. Who else could it be?

"WHERE IS SHE?!"

The priest coward in fear. "...I'm sorry?"

"Don't f*ck with me, man. You sent those walkers on us, didn't you? You waited for her to come out so you could take her?!"

"Brother, I don't know..."

"Shut up!" Daryl threw the man to the ground and pinned him there with one foot. He then aimed his crossbow at the priest He didn't care for how blasphemous attacking a man of God was. This was Beth. And it sure as hell wasn't going to matter in this world anymore. "I'm gonna ask you one more time and you're gonna answer me straight...where is she? The girl you took from the funeral home?"

"The funeral home..."

"'See your memory hasn't gone to sh*t. Now spill!"

"Brother, I know the funeral home which you speak, but I took no one. I would never do..."

"Don't give me that sh*t!" said Daryl. "You had it all planned out, didn't you? The food, the dead people. That was your dog wasn't it? The white one missin' an eye?!"

The priest's eyes widened. "The dog?"

Daryl had his finger on the trigger of his bow ready to fire.

"Listen to me brother," the priest pleaded. "Many weeks ago, I came across the funeral home and I met a man there. He asked me to give them their last rites and I did. I asked him...I asked him why he stayed there...why he tended to the bodies? He said it was because it was meant to be now. That we were all dead. I saw the bodies...some were walkers but not all of them. I knew he had killed them first... He was a mad man..."

"What's your point, man?"

"He asked where my church was and I told him. He said he would hold the funeral there for the one he loved. I did not understand. I saw no female corpses at the funeral home. A few nights ago...he came when I was asleep. I awoke to screams in the basement but I was too terrified to investigate...the screams of a girl. I had to leave. He waits for me to perform her funeral but I couldn't stay!"

As the priest wept cowardly, Daryl had enough. "You bastard...you left her there to die?"

"I do not know if she's dead."

"Guess we'll haveta find out, won't we?" said Daryl. "Come on, take me to your church!"

...

He kept his crossbow pointed to the priest's head as he lead him to his church, about a day's walk.

"Wait," said the priest. "I should go in alone. This man is dangerous. He won't hesitate to kill your friend if she still lives."

"Fine," said Daryl.

The priest went into the chapel alone while Daryl searched for an open window to peak through. Inside it was dark, the only light was coming from the altar surrounded by candles. In the front pews he thought he saw a small group of people but Daryl could see upon closer inspection, that they were not people at all. They were corpses, dressed in their Sunday clothes...thankfully motionless. Daryl remembered how the bodies at the funeral home resembled the lifeless audience. It didn't change the fact that this person was crazy. He could see a well dressed man leaning over an open casket at the alter but Daryl could not see anymore than that.

The man could hear someone coming in from the main door. "Father Gabriel, you've returned."

"Yes..." he said nervously. "Forgive me...my task took longer than expected."

"I've prepared everything for you," said the man. "Look how many have come to see her. Isn't she beautiful? I wish you got to hear her singing. I heard her from outside my funeral home and I knew she was the one."

"Does she have a name?" Father Gabriel asked.

"She told me her name was Beth."

At that moment, Daryl broke through one of the windows then made his way straight towards the altar...to the crazy man. He grabbed him by the collar and threw him hard to the ground. "GET OUTTA THE WAY!" Daryl growled. He wished the force of the throw were enough to kill the man, but that was not his main concern right now. His concern was with the body in that casket. Killing the man would come later.

His worst fears were confirmed. Seeing Beth in that casket was surreal in the most unpleasant of forms. She was dressed in a cream-colored gown with her hands rested at her lap holding a small bouquet of flowers...not just flowers...Cherokee Roses, because the world had to be f*cking ironically cruel to Daryl Dixon like that.

Father Gabriel watched as Daryl's hand angrily gripped the side of the casket...his head dropped low. He tried to approach Daryl but after only two steps, Daryl quickly grabbed his crossbow and pointed it at the priest once more. "STAY BACK!" The heavy breathing...the sweat on his anger-ridden face...Father Gabriel knew he was looking at the face of a man who looked as though the apocalypse had just happened...a man who had just lost his entire world.

Daryl eventually lowered his crossbow and looked over at Beth. She looked so peaceful in that casket that it was unfair...for both of them, to know that this was the only place where they would both find such rest in this world.

He remembered how Beth appreciated the work this crazy man did on the bodies, wanting to give them a nice funeral where they could resemble their former selves and not that of the dead. Daryl didn't want to admit to himself that the man did make Beth look beautiful. Still, he had to know how bad it was...how much of her face had to be rebuilt from her death. He slowly took two fingers pressing them gently against her cheek. Her skin felt lukewarm but other than that Daryl felt nothing. No grease, no makeup. He was confused. Her face hadn't gone pale. He gently examined the rest of her face and brushed through her hair. Not only was there no presence of makeup, there was no presence of a head wound. She would have turned walker by now without one.

He pressed his fingers hard against her neck...it was faint and slow but he swears by it...there was a pulse.

"She's alive!"

Everything was soon forgotten as Daryl carefully tried to pull Beth out of the casket. He failed to see the man get up. "Stop! Don't disturb her rest!"

"I ain't disturbing nothin'. She's still alive, dammit!"

"I know," said the man. "She was so beautiful I couldn't bring myself to do it. So I gave her sedatives, strong enough to last till after her burial."

"The hell is wrong with you?!" Daryl turned to Father Gabriel. "You...help me get 'er out!"

The crazy man seemed determined to stop them and was running to a chained door in the far corner of the room. "I'm sorry, I cannot let you." As soon as he removed the chains and flung the door opened a large group of active walkers began flooding into the chapel.

Daryl had to abandon his efforts to get Beth out. They weren't going to make it with all of these walkers around. But as he started shooting arrows, he knew that it would be a brief and hopeless effort. But much to his luck many of the walkers were more interested in Father Gabriel and the crazy man who was trying to fight them off with his knife. Daryl shot at whatever walkers he could and then he quickly worked to pull out Beth on his own. He was in a rush, no time to be gentle as he carried her past the pews and through the main doors.

A few walkers were still about as they found their way through a cemetery. Daryl had to let Beth rest against a tree even if there was no chance of her waking. But then he heard a soft moan from her. There was the fear that she had died and turned after all until...

"Daryl..."

"Beth? Beth, it's me."

Her eyes partly opened but not for very long and her head dropped down again. "Sh*t," said Daryl. "He drugged you good. Don't matter. I'm gettin' you outta here."

It started to rain as he picked her up again and made their way through the graveyard.

"Stop!"

Daryl looked back at the crazy man holding a hand gun. There was no way for Daryl to put Beth down and grab for his crossbow and have the both of them make it out alive. Regardless of the outcome, he wasn't leaving Beth...not again.

The man holding the gun began his trek towards the pair, but was then struck from behind causing him to fall into an open grave. Father Gabriel stepped out from behind the nearby tree with a shovel. The man now lied unconscious in the hole that was to be for Beth.

Daryl gave a nod, then disappeared with Beth into the woods while Father Gabriel commenced with digging dirt into the grave.

So I have another dark drabble but it would be weird to have two dark ones in a row would it? I should be updating my other fics anyway.