Negan held off the dead with the help of Timmy's knife and his natural ability to kick the shit out of roamers. Only when the sound of Rae's car pulling away told him she was safe did he scramble up the embankment which he'd tumbled down.

He peered over the grassy edge with cautious eyes, double checking that a certain fiery redhead wasn't baiting him into her trap. She wasn't and part of him was disappointed, not because he thought she'd missed out on a golden opportunity but more because he'd spent the last week looking forward to seeing her and his plans had well and truly fallen down the shithole.

Negan pulled himself all the way up onto the road, wondering how the hell Rae had managed Timmy up the hill and feeling surprised to see a set of car keys waiting on the roof of Timmy's car. Although he shouldn't have been surprised. This was Rae and she might have shot him with 50,000 volts and threatened to kill him but under those threats she was a good girl at heart. Regardless of her reasons Negan decided to take this small gesture to mean that she was still interested in him at least enough to give him a fighting chance and that was all he ever needed anyway.

With a smile he grabbed the keys and popped the trunk, sighing in relief when his gaze landed on "Lucille." Negan had only hoped that Timmy had brought her and with the impending shitstorm he was going to need at least one of his girls on his side. He picked her up, admiring her before taking a swing at the roamer that had chased him to the road. Brain matter flew through the air, splatting on the tarmac like jello and it might not have been Timmy's skull but it was a start.

With that in mind he considered following Rae back home but even with the men he'd left at the farm across the field it wouldn't be enough for him to feel comfortable. He had no idea what Rick was planning and he wasn't going to walk into a fight with his dick in his hand. So with the fuel tank running on fumes Negan made it back to the Sanctuary just after nightfall and he was barely through the gate before he was jumping from the car and yelling for Simon.

"What happened?" Simon said, following hot on Negan's heels as they stormed through the halls to his apartment.

"Not here," Negan replied, casting a wary eye to the people they were passing. He'd realised that Rick finding Rae would have been like finding Sherry's personality, unlikely as fuck. That meant someone had told him about her and that someone could be anyone, he didn't exactly have many friends around here. Negan didn't want anyone to ask questions just as much as he didn't want anyone to hear what he had to say, except of course for Simon. Out of all the fuckers in the Sanctuary he trusted Simon.

Kirsten was sitting in his room when they got there, her lipstick freshly painted, her breasts falling out of her bra as she stretched out across the chaise like cleo-fucking-patra.

"Jesus christ!" Negan exclaimed, storming through the door. "Did you not fucking understand the words leave and never fucking come back?"

A slow smile crept across Kirsten face, "you married me for better or worse, Negan."

"Then you're right in fucking time for the worse part sweetheart," Negan ran agitated fingers over his face, his head pounding as hard as his heart. This was the nightmare he'd been trying to avoid and every part of it was his fault. The wives, Rae, Rick, his people. It was all a web of fucked up.

He remembered leaving Lucille's room and the months he'd spent on the road. He'd promised himself he wouldn't be one of those dead fuckers, he'd swore to himself that he'd stick it out alone and somewhere in between he'd ended up with all these lives in his hands and the responsibility to keep them breathing.

"Everything's fucked," he decided, ignoring Kirsten's unholy presence as he paced around the room before pouring a glass of bourbon. He knocked the liquid back, relishing the burn and quickly pouring another.

"The redhead?" Simon said, standing in front of him with his arms crossed and a look of concern furrowed into his brow.

"The redhead, Rick-Fucking-Grimes, take your pick," Negan announced gesturing his drink in a cheers to the universe before downing it in one painful gulp.

Simon's eyes narrowed, his hand now resting on his pistol as if to show he was ready to fight, ready to do whatever it took. "What happened today? Are the men you took dead?"

With a second glass of bourbon sitting in his stomach Negan's heart finally began to slow its pace. "Nobody's dead. Not yet. But we need to send word to the outposts, they need to send every able bodied fucker they have. "

"Sir?"

"Do I need to fucking spell things out? Rick Grimes is planning something with his merry band of assfucks and I'm not gonna sit around playing pass the pig while he gets organised." Negan rubbed his temple, sighing, he'd been King Dick for a long time and part of him knew this moment would come he just didn't know it would come so soon. "We're going to war. "

"I'll send word tonight," Simon replied coolly, his unwavering tone singing like music to Negan's ears.

"Thank you," Negan said, glancing at his right hand man. He meant it and he was starting to realise just how important the right kind of people were.

"You're tense," Kirsten purred when Simon left the room, the sound of her voice grating his eardrums and the shock of her presence making his heart do a double take.

"What are you still doing here?" Negan muttered, his thumb brushing across his leather jacket, tracing the slice Tim had left before he shrugged it from his shoulders and screwed it into a ball.

"Till death do us part," she whispered down his ear, her hands kneading circles on his shoulders, her body pressed close enough for him to smell the lotion she drenched herself in.

Negan shrugged her off, throwing his jacket across the room, "I don't remember agreeing to those vows."

Kirsten laughed, "well you'd say anything to get your end wet."

Negan didn't find the joke very funny, in fact when he thought about how Rae had accused of basically the same thing he found it quite the opposite of funny. Still, he didn't say anything. Because despite what Negan liked to think about himself sometimes even he was all out of fight.

He'd spent part of the day strung up in a barn, part of it riding in the trunk of a car. He'd been tasered, punched and fallen ass over tit down the side of a hill. So, without a fight he let Kirsten pour him a glass of bourbon, he even let her ease him into his chair and when she knelt between his legs he snorted.

Kirsten frowned, her painted smile drooping like melted plastic, "I might not be her but at least I'm here and I'll do whatever you want."

Negan sipped his bourbon, his eyes closed. It had been so easy to get people to kneel for him and if he was completely honest he'd been addicted to it. Taking power and being King Dick. They were all dead anyway. At least that's what he'd decided, or what he'd thought when responsibility tried to bite him in the ass. He didn't think that anymore. Some people might have been dead but some people were living and Negan wanted to be alive.

Kirsten caressed down his legs before she began removing his boots, her hands delicately pulling at the laces as if a sudden movement would change his mind except his mind had been set for a while now.

"Kirsten, I don't want you to take of my boots and I don't want you to do what I want. That's the whole fucking point. I don't wanna fuck a dead girl anymore. Rae wouldn't kneel and take off my boots unless my goddamn arms had fallen off and I wouldn't want her too. We take off our own fucking boots and we do what we want." He slid his tumbler of bourbon onto the table and laughed bitterly. "If she wants to kill me then I can't really do anything about it but, and I want you to understand this part, I really fucking do. I'd still choose her, I'd still want her."

Kirsten stood, scowling at him like a spoilt child, "then she'll get you killed and I'll still be here and there are other men that would kill to have me."

"Maybe you will Kirsten and good fucking luck to you. I mean it. I don't give you credit. You're a survivor. You use your pussy and you're fucking first class at it. But if you creep into my apartment and bring your dead pussy near me again then I will throw you from the fucking window, do you understand?"

She gasped, covering what was left of her modesty with her hands, her heels clicking against the floor before she hurled a last ditch attempt at an insult, "I hope she cuts your balls off!"

Funnily enough Negan had never liked Kirsten more than he did at that moment. He laughed, finishing his third glass of bourbon and falling into bed like he wasn't on the brink of war. He needed to shut it out, he needed to sleep and tomorrow he'd do what needed to be done.

The next morning he was up with the sun and as requested Simon had already sent messages to the outposts. By this evening Negan's army would be at full strength. Strength enough to crush Rick or anyone who stood against him. But first he wanted to have a conversation with Rachel Honey and this time it was going to be on his terms.

Negan took an armed procession to join him on his little conversation. Their first stop was the farm across the field where he found his outpost of men untouched and useless as fuck. Any other day he would have roasted them but today he didn't have the time to ask exactly how they'd let Rick get to Rae or sat on their asses while he was almost killed. Instead he drove his procession of Saviors right up to the gate of the Matchstick Fort and it reminded him of the day he'd done the same thing only that day Jacob had been the bad guy and he was the hero.

As an unwelcome guest the 50 cal sitting overwatch on the gate looked more intimidating than he remembered but it wasn't enough to stop him from stepping out of the truck, Lucille slung on his shoulder and a cocky bounce in his step.

Negan didn't know the woman on the gate but she clearly knew him as she pointed her rifle his way and demanded, "what have you come for?"

Negan forced a smile, a bead of sweat rolling down the back of his neck despite the frost of the day. This could end up being a terrible fucking idea but if he acted like he was in control then maybe he would be. "I'm here to speak to Rae."

The look that filled the woman's face wasn't what he expected. She looked surprised, her aim wavering as she glanced over her shoulder, whispering something he couldn't quite hear.

Negan didn't move a muscle except for his hand which wrapped in a death grip around Lucille. Hell, he was barely breathing as he tried to hear his whispered fate. The woman nodded, disappearing from view and his gaze focused on the 50 cal, his body tensing as he recalled how easily the bullets had sliced through Jacob's men.

He was considering getting back into his truck and thinking of a better plan when the next face he saw was Grandma Ellie's and she wasn't standing at the 50 cal, nor was anyone else. He might have breathed in relief except the wrinkles in her face were a little deeper, her eyes ringed with red.

"What have you done to my baby?" she choked, her hands gripping the wooden fort as if she might collapse without the support.

Negan lost the cool he was trying to maintain as quickly as he forgot he'd been feeling afraid. "What the hell are you saying? Someone better start talking right fucking now!"

Grandma Ellie began to cry, her words even weaker, "Rae hasn't come home. She left to find you and Tim and you're here and they're not."

"What have you done with them?" the rifle woman demanded, her aim a little truer now.

"What have I done with them?" Negan roared, waving Lucille towards the walls of the fort as if he might smash his way through the wood. "Jesus Christ! If I'd have done something with them then you can be damn sure I wouldn't have been rolling up and knocking on the fucking door! I don't wanna hear anymore of this fucking bullshit, if I was gonna hurt you people you can fucking believe that I've already had every motherfucking chance!"

Grandma disappeared from sight and Negan swallowed the rest of his fucks but not his rage. He was considering ramming the gate open with his truck when it began to ease open on its own, making enough space for Grandma Ellie to hobble out, the bags under her eyes telling him she hadn't slept a wink and his rage cooling down to concern.

She stood before him, her green eyes searching his and looking so much like Rae's before she finally spoke, "I think we all know you're not exactly a good man are you, Negan? But I don't believe you're an entirely bad man either. I'm sorry for what I said but I'm not ashamed to admit I'm scared right now and I know that you're a part of all this. But no matter what I think or what anyone here thinks, Rae has decided to care about you anyway. If something has happened to her and if it's something you've caused then you need to make it right. You need to bring her back to me. I can't lose another one of my grandbabies. Do you understand me?"

Negan slumped, Lucille slipping from his shoulder, "I know I've fucked things up. Lord knows all I seem to do is fuck things up but…" maybe he wasn't saying this to the right Honey but maybe he wanted to test it out for size, "I'm in love with your Granddaughter and I'm gonna find her and bring her home."

Grandma cupped his cheeks, her hands frail and warm, her eyes watering on the verge of tears "good. Now you watch your language and bring her back to us."

"Are you saying I've got your approval, Grandma Ellie?"

"I wouldn't call it my approval but you're not the worst boy that girl has ever brought home so I can make some allowances."

"I think that might be the nicest thing you've ever said to me, Grandma Ellie," the nicest thing any potential in law had ever said to him. Negan kissed her cheek and winked, "I'm gonna leave some men to help you guard the fort and under no conditions do you let any fu- one in unless it's me or Rae. I want you and Zuzu to stay in the house and let me and my men take care of everything else."

The Honey House was home and it was worth fighting for, worth living for, worth dying for and if anyone had touched one hair on Rae's head then he wouldn't stop until everything but the matchstick fort was burnt to dust.