Disclaimer—I don't own or make claim to the characters from The Walking Dead. I only own my original characters

When I arrive in the townhouse, Michonne is in the office. I've been told that this was Deanna Monroe's office, the former leader of Alexandria. When she died, they continued to use it for town business. Maggie used to conduct a lot of it, but now that she's moved to the Hilltop, Michonne and Rick mainly use it. Michonne gestures to me to have a seat.

"I'm sure you're wondering why I asked you to stop by," she begins. I nod, "It's crossed my mind, yes."

"Sandi, we have some work to do now that the war is over, and I need your help with it." I give her an inquiring look. "What can I help with? My job is done, I gave you intel and we took out Negan. I had some very specific knowledge to help you with, but now that's over."

Michonne shakes her head. "Sandi, you have more to offer than just what's in the past. You have relationships at all of the communities now. I think the next step for us all is to find a way to work together, to work toward our future. I'd like you to help me work on that."

"Help you how? I agree that working together is in everyone's best interest, but I'm not certain how I can help with that?"

"Well, I'd like to get the communities to come to an agreement. Agree how we live in this world, how we interact with one another, perhaps a charter of sorts. If we can agree on how we live, how we trade, how we punish people, then I think that can be our first step toward rebuilding civilization."

I take in her words and nod. "I can see that it would be an advantage to get everyone on the same page with those kinds of things. I forget that rules just don't exist anymore, so we need to create some that all can agree to. You were a lawyer, so you're suited to write a charter, but how can I help? I took history like everyone else, but I don't think I have any skill at writing rules or charters."

"You're right, I can write the charter. I've already started, actually. But we need your help as an ambassador of sorts."

"An ambassador? Like the United Nations?"

She smiles. "Yes, a bit like that, except I don't know that there would be more than one at this point."

I question, "I'd be the only one? Isn't each nation, or in our case, community, supposed to have their own?"

"Yes, back in the old world each nation would have their own. But this is a new world and we have few people compared to the way things used to be. Honestly, we don't have that many people in the communities that would make good diplomats right now. You have a unique position in this world. It was your words that brought each of the communities to the fight, to join together. You have a natural gift for diplomacy. The biggest thing of all though, is that each community trusts you. They followed you to war and I believe they'll follow you to an agreement for the greater good."

I start waving my hands, "No, no, no. They didn't follow me to war. I gathered them, yes, but it was Rick, Maggie, Cyndie and King Ezekiel that they were following, their own leaders."

Michonne smiles. "I think you underestimate what you did. Yes, they were all following their individual community leaders. But you are the one that brought them together. They were following you as well. When we were planning, they were all looking to you for the plan and for instructions-including the leaders."

I shake my head. "I'm good at planning, so yes, they wanted my input. But I disagree that I led this war."

Michonne laughs. "Can we at least agree that you helped to facilitate?"

I nod slowly. "Yes, I suppose I can agree with that."

"I would also point out that you ended up at almost every community afterwards, reassuring people that everything was going to be OK, setting up schedules and persuading saviors that they could start a new life," Michonne says. "The workers from the saviors know you and trust you so you have a connection there with them as well."

"OK, I'll concede I did some reassuring," I say. "So what is it exactly that you want me to do?"

"I'd like you to help me get the charter written, passed and signed by all communities."

I take a deep breath. "Wow, that's a tall order. Aren't you still writing it, why would you need help with writing it?"

She nods, "Yes, I am. But that's why we need to start now. We need to start talking to all the communities while the way we worked together to defeat Negan and the saviors is still fresh in everyone's mind. While they still remember how well we all worked together. And we can't present a completed charter to them ready to sign right now."

"Why not?" I ask.

"Because it can't be something that was written by one community. It has to be a multi-community effort. If I write it all myself and we present it to everyone else, they'll feel like it's Alexandria dictating to them how we are all going to live. They'll never agree to sign it in that case." I nod, that makes sense now that she explains it. She continues, "That's why we need you. I've written the preamble. I'd like you to take it to the other communities. Visit with their leaders and their residents about it. Talk about what a charter between the communities would look like. What they think the rules should be. I have some ideas, but this needs to come from the people. You get the feedback of each community and bring it back to me."

I look at her confused, "But If I am the one negotiating with them, won't they still think Alexandria is trying to dictate to them? After all, I live in Alexandria as well."

She shakes her head. "You would be basically representing the interests of all the communities. I think they'll tell you what they think and be honest with you about it. If it was anyone but you, no, I don't think this would work. But they already trust you and they know you represent more than just Alexandria's interests. They see you as representing the common good like you did with planning the war with Negan. After the first round with the preamble, I'll draft more of it based on your feedback. You take it around again, present it and get more feedback. Does it have what they are looking for, are there pieces missing, are there pieces they don't want in there? Why? Then I'll draft another with the feedback and you make the rounds again. Each time, you point out to each community where you got the pieces they wanted put into it-or where you got the pieces they didn't want taken out. They can feel you are representing them, that they are having direct input into this charter. If we keep at it, we'll reach a place where everyone agrees and have a signed charter. That will be our starting point. We can build civilization from there. Then, when we find more communities, they can join our charter as well. We can grow and we can take back this world from the dead in a civilized manner."

I sit there trying to take it all in. This is huge, but I agree with her that it's a necessary step. Unless and until we can all agree on some basic standards, we can't be a larger community but just small outposts trying to hold our own against the dead. If we want to grow, if we want to take back our world, this has to happen. We came together as one because of the threat, because of Negan, because of common interests. Michonne is right, unless we can find something to anchor us all together we will quickly fracture back into separate groups with no real connection again.

Michonne picks up some paperwork from her desk and hands it to me. "Maybe this will help, read what I've drafted of the preamble so far." I take the paper in my hands and begin to read. 'Any person who would live in peace and fairness, who would find common ground, this world is yours by right. We stand together for life, not death, in this new world. Together, we make this world bigger. The future is ours as we hold onto our faith in one another with everything that we have. To consecrate our bond, we establish this Multi-Community Charter of Rights and Freedoms.' Wow. This is good. I look up at Michonne with a smile and tell her so. "This is very good, an excellent start I think."

She smiles. "Will you help me then? Will you negotiate with the communities?"

I shake my head, I'm still surprised she wants me to do this. "I want to help, but it sounds like a lot of traveling will be involved." She smiles. "I guess it all depends on how persuasive you are on how many times you have to travel, make the rounds. But yes, there will be a bit of travel and a bit of time spent at each of the communities. Nothing more than what you already did both before and after the war though. Your kids are welcome to accompany you, of course."

I think for a minute and then ask, "Have you already spoken to Rick about this?"

"About the Charter? Yes, he knows I wanted to write one, to try to get all the communities to agree to to one. He thinks it's a good idea."

"Well, not just about the Charter, but about your idea to have me work as an ambassador to promote the charter? About how much I would have to travel around the communities and be gone from Alexandria while we work on this?"

She sees where I am going with this. "Well, no, I told him we'd need someone able to promote the charter and sell it to the different communities. But I didn't tell him I specifically had you in mind."

That makes a lot more sense now. After our discussions and negotiations today, I just didn't get the feeling he knew about Michonne's intention to send me out and about in the various communities. He would have said something considering the breadth and depth our our discussions. I can't imagine he'd be very happy about me taking this on when we just decided to start spending more time together. That would be hard if I'm always somewhere else. It would have been perfect if I was going to continue to run and avoid him, but that time is over. I look up at Michonne. "You need to talk to him about it then. I would like to help, I think this is a great idea. But, he and I just reached a bit of an agreement, made some decisions that will bring some peace to our relationship. I don't want to do anything to disrupt it right now. He would need to agree to me doing this, being this ambassador that you're talking about. You need to talk to him about that part. If you can get him to agree then I'm willing to try to get everyone to create and sign a Charter."

She looks at me in surprise. "You're waiting for his permission? I've never pegged you as someone who had to have a man's permission to do something."

I sigh. "You're right, I'm not. If I feel strongly about something, I do it, even before the world ended. But Michonne, I underestimated how much I worried him during this war." I think of the tears in his eyes earlier today talking about how Negan could have killed me. "Especially when I took on Negan. I just agreed to check in with him anytime I leave Alexandria as a penance of sorts for charging in on my own. To prove to him I'm responsible and using my common sense rather than just running into things blindly." Michonne is looking at me in disbelief. "You agreed to this?" she asks with shock in her voice. I look her in the eyes. "I did. I scared him Michonne. If this is what it takes for him to trust me again, to make him understand that I'm capable, then this is what I'll do. It's only for the next month or so. But that means you need to get his agreement to let me do this. Talk to him about your full plan and explain to him what you want me to do and why you think it needs to be me that does it. If you can get him to agree then I'll be your ambassador."

She nods. "I'll talk to him about it then. He'll have to agree that you're really the best person to do this. I take it that you finally talked then?"

I huff out a breath. "Yes, we talked earlier. A lot. Hammered a few things out. Overall I think it went well, but we'll see how everything goes over the next few weeks and months." She smiles, "I'm glad you two have ironed things out then. I don't want this to become a new point of contention, so I'll talk to him about it. Nudge him and get him to agree that it's for the best. Don't worry, I'll get him to agree. I'm nothing if not persistent." I laugh at her saying, "Well, I'm going to tell him that it's up to him. I can see how it'd be good for all the communities, but I'll leave him in charge of this decision." Her eyes query me, "You really feel bad about going around him to get to Negan, huh?" I nod and then shake my head. "I don't feel bad about going after Negan, I can't feel bad about it. I did what was necessary and he had to be taken out. But, yes, I feel bad that I couldn't find an agreement with Rick or a way to work with him to take out Negan. I didn't have any idea until today how much I scared him and I regret that. Maybe I could have found a better way, I don't know. But now I'm going to try to do better, be a better communicator. We'll still have things we disagree about, that's a given. But maybe we can find a way through it in harmony after this." I shrug my shoulders. I have no real idea how this all is going to work. I just have to believe that it can. I committed to giving this relationship a chance, and that's what I'm going to do.

A/N So, what do you think of Michonne's plan and Sandi deferring to Rick to make the decision? How do you think Rick will react to the idea?

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