"I don't wanna be the one leadin these people anymore." Daryl told Rick.
Rick sighed and looked at him, "Okay. Why? Because of Angel?"
"That's part of it. Bein here behind these walls, it just don't feel right, for neither of us." Daryl looked around him at the walls, "We're better out there. Always have been. She has nightmares more now, like she used to when we first met up after this all started. I know it's because she's here. Where he did the same thing to people. We both belong out there."
"You kept this place together, you kept this place in line here." Rick leaned on the bannister towards him, "We can't just let the Sanctuary fail after everything that's happened."
Daryl wasn't going to let him do this again, "Man, it's gunna fail anyway. Nothin grows here, it's a damn factory man. Look man when Negan was around, he needed people to provide for him, it's still the same, nothins changed."
"No." Rick shook his head, "It's different now, we give what we give willingly."
"It wasn't willin that Angel went into the city for more than two months lookin for stuff to get this place on it's feet." Daryl finally told him.
"She what?" Rick looked at him confused.
"How do you think we went this long without needin to go on a run?" Daryl asked him, "She's been doin so much for these people and you're the one the clap for. After what you did to her. And she did it for me, so I don have to be here, but I still am. Now that most of the bridges are out after the storm, she can't make it out there with her van, which means that we're going to have start takin more from other places so that they can survive. The highways done, we've gotten every drop of gas in five miles of here, pretty soon it's gunna be more than a day's ride from one spot to another."
"Well it's on us to figure out how to make it work." Rick told him.
Daryl shook his head, "Man there ain't no us anymore. Everyone's everywhere. That small group we had, back in the beginning, we could do anything. That was right, that's what I know."
"Well you guys wanna come home to Alexandria, I'm gunna need Angels word that she'll stay away from Negan." Rick told him.
"Nah, we're going to Hilltop, check in on Maggie and the baby." Daryl was definitive.
"Well you go someone's gotta take your place." Rick started, "Rosita and Eugene are headed to Oceanside next, Maggie's sending food but not people, and Kingdoms got its own problems rebuilding after losing it's fighters. If Alexandria sends another person out, I could use the help back home."
"Angel won't take it back. And if she ain't goin, neither am I." Daryl looked at him, he wasn't budging on this, he told Angel he would do it and he was.
Rick sighed again, "We're not together because things have changed."
"Mmhmm." Daryl agreed, "Thing is, you changed 'em Rick."
Daryl saw Angel walking across the cat walks and patted Rick on the shoulder as he walked away, going to smoke a cigarette before he told her everything.
When he got back to their room, he was surprised to see her awake in their bed reading, "You're still up?"
"Mmhmm." She answered back, using a torn piece of paper to mark her spot. "You were talking to Rick for a while." He came over and gave her a kiss and she held him there, "You were smoking without me."
"You know you shouldn't." He told her, giving her another peck.
"If I can't then neither can you." She smirked at him.
"Oh, it's gonna be like that?" He raised an eyebrow.
"Only if I'm carrying your kid." She laughed and he laughed too kissing her again, "How'd Rick take it?"
"Not well." He laid down on the bed, kicking off his boots. "Wants us to come back to Alexandria."
"Negan dead?" Angel rolled her eyes.
"I told him we aint goin there." He looked at her, getting comfortable, "Told him we're goin to Hilltop."
"Wow, look at you putting your foot down." She smiled at him, "That's my sexy husband."
"Stop." He lightly elbowed her in the hip, which was the closest thing to his elbow until she started lying down at the same level he was.
She turned on her side to face him. "I'm proud of you…but I kinda feel bad."
"Why?" He asked.
"Because I was saying that you're just taking orders from Rick…but did you really want to leave here? If I hadn't of said anything about it, would you still want to go?" She asked.
He pressed his lips to hers, hand cupping her face, "I hate it here as much as you do, I wanna be gone too. I had to try though if he asked, I know for sure it ain't gunna work now."
"Okay." She accepted his answered, "I was just making sure."
"Plus, this ain't no place for a baby." He pulled her to him, his arm around her waist.
"You're really certain I'm pregnant." She laughed.
"If you ain't after everything we've done this past month, I'm gunna make you lie down for a week afterwards." He smiled.
"Daryl Dixon, one of us would die, me of boredom or you of my wrath." She joked.
"I'm just sayin." He kissed her on the forehead. He nuzzled his head to hers, "Carol says she's gunna take over here. For us."
"What about her though? Ezekiel, Henry, and Sophia?" Angel lifted her head to look at him.
"She said that it's fine, she needs a lil time, but she'll go back. She wants us to be happy again." He put her head back to his chest.
"If she's sure." Angel wanted Rick to have to do it.
"She is." He kissed her again, before looking at her wrapped up arm, "Now get some rest so this heals."
"Yessir." She answered back, cuddling into his chest.
When they got to Hilltop, she saw Maggie with a huge gash on her face. Angel's blood boiled, "Where the hell is he?"
"Angel, it's fine, we've got it taken care of." Maggie told her, "If you could check on Enid though that'd be great."
"Yeah of course." Angel said, heading into the trailer she knew Enid still stayed in.
Enid told her everything Gregory did, and that Maggie was executing him that night. Angel completely agreed with this and when it was time, she rolled Enid out in a wheel chair, not comfortable with letting the girl stand just yet with the major cut on her head, she didn't know what kind of trauma had been done. When she got there, Daryl came up to her and asked her to get a horse and she did.
Upon returning more people were around the construction site and Daryl was bringing Gregory out. She held the horse steady as they forced him on top of it, the noose already around his neck. She held the rope tight as Daryl tied it. Rick and Michonne joined and watched as the two helped Maggie deliver her justice. Angel just gave Michonne a look: You know this is right, but you wouldn't be able to do it.
She stood next to Daryl as Maggie told everyone what was happening, then Daryl moved and hit the horse as Michonne yelled for Maggie to stop because there were children. Angel just shook her head, the kids would find out that he'd died. She at least understood where Michonne was coming on this one, despite how she did it, but she was right that kids shouldn't see that, not yet.
Finally, after he was dead, Daryl cut Gregory down.
They'd started work on the bridge and Angel was sitting off to the side, smoking a cigarette. Daryl came up beside her, "The hell you think you're doing?"
"I started my period last night." She sighed. He let out a sigh and she took his arm, pulling her to him, "Hey, at least we have fun during the process."
"Yeah." He muttered.
"Daryl." She laughed, "It takes time, only lucky or unlucky people get pregnant first go around."
"What do you mean?" He asked, taking the cigarette from her.
"A girl I went to high school with got pregnant losing her virginity." She told him, "Very unlucky. She was fifteen, didn't even get to enjoy it."
He laughed, "Yeah, alright, it takes time."
"Yes, it does." She gave him a kiss, "So be patient and don't stress about it. Stress makes it harder."
"K, c'mon, I need your help with moving this pile of logs." He pulled her forward.
"Oh, I can't smoke but I can lift logs huh?" She laughed following behind him.
"You don't want me to treat you like your sick so you're gunna do work." He smirked back at her.
Daryl was working on putting down wood with Aaron and the man was telling him about Gracie, "So I pick her up, and her diaper just explodes all over me."
"Sounds like good times." Daryl said, he'd dealt with walker guts, he could deal with that.
"Oh, the best." Aaron told him, "You'll see."
"Huh?" Daryl asked.
"I see the way you are with Angel, keeping her from carrying things that are too heavy, making sure she drinks enough water, things like that." Aaron smiled at him, "She's pregnant, isn't she?"
"Nah." Daryl told him, it'd been another month and still nothing.
"Are you guys trying?" Aaron asked, now very confused by the way Daryl was acting with her.
"Yeah." He admitted, Aaron was like both of their family now.
"You're going to be a great dad." Aaron said, "Protective, caring, you have amazing manners to teach them."
"Man, shut up." Daryl held back a smirk.
"My grandmother said that every time she ate watermelon, she'd get pregnant." Aaron smiled at him, "Might be worth trying to find some."
"Where?" Daryl asked, incredulously.
"Yeah, I don't know." Aaron shrugged, "Fish too, that's what my dad said."
"That's a little easier." Daryl put a nail in his mouth, holding it there, while letting out a little laugh before getting distracted by Justin being an ass.
He saw the man going after the Henry and he went to go and stop him. Justin swung at him and he swung back, hitting him onto a pile of saw dust. Justin grabbed a hand full of the dust and threw it at him, before tackling him into a pile of wood. Daryl couldn't see and his eyes burned, but he felt the man get pulled off of him. Then he heard Angel, "You wanna fight dirty like a little bitch come on!"
"Ang!" He yelled unable to see.
Angel didn't stop though, she round house kicked the man in the face, knocking him back before grabbing him by the shirt and dragging him to the edge of the bridge, "You wanna pull that shit? Fuck with my husband?"
Daryl was squinting trying to see what was going on and was able to make out Justins upper half hanging off the bridge as she held him by the hem of his shirt. He heard her yell, "Fucking apologize before he gets up and beats the shit out of you!"
The man pulled his leg up and kicked her in the hip, Aaron sprung into action being stopped by another Savior, the two of them fighting now. Daryl could see pretty well again, and he grabbed his leg before he tried to kick Angel again, pulling him back and hitting him in the jaw. Angel got back, this wasn't her fight originally but when she saw Justin hit Daryl in the jaw again, she let out a yell going for him as Rick came up, pulling the two men apart. Justin egged him on, "Gotta have your little bitch come and defend you?!"
Daryl tried to shove past Rick, "Say that shit about her again!"
"Stop!" Rick yelled and Daryl spit out blood, taking Angel by the hand, leading her away from the bridge.
When they got back to camp, she tried looking at his face, but he stopped her, unbuttoning her pants, "Lemme see."
She stopped, knowing that he wouldn't let her take care of him until he made sure she was alright. He pulled her pants down past her hips and looked at the red mark from where Justin had kicked her. Running his thumb over it, it didn't make it up to her stomach, so he wasn't that worried. He let out the breath he was holding and wrapped his arms around her, "Imma kill him."
"No, you're not." She hugged him back, "We did more damage to him, and he got beat up by a girl."
"He called you a bitch." He looked at her.
"You've called me a bitch too before." She laughed, "Daryl, let's just get this damn bridge built then find our cabin in the woods."
"Yeah." That had never sounded better to him, maybe the lack of stress would help them in more way than one, he missed the library, he wouldn't mind staying there even. He sat down finally letting her check his mouth and eyes.
Angel sat outside the tent as Carol, Rick, and Daryl talked about what had happened on the bridge. Carol had told her it might work out better if she wasn't in there and Angel knew she was right, her and Rick definitely wouldn't get along. She was proud of him, finally standing up to Rick again after so long of just falling in beside him. Listening to him say that some of them wouldn't fall in line just because Rick said so was the truth that Rick needed to hear, whether he liked it or not, it was the truth. Carol was on Daryls side.
She rolled her eyes as Rick said, 'It hasn't been easy, I know.' Carol was right that she shouldn't go in there because she would have blown up on Rick right there. What the hell did he know? He hasn't been actively dealing with anything. He's been playing house for the past year and a half. He's been happy at home with his kid and wife. He didn't know shit.
Hearing as Daryl asked if they were on the same side, she heard Rick give him back attitude and Daryl gave it right back. When he left the tent, he saw her sitting there and went up to her, "Does it gotta be a cabin? Libraries all set up already."
"Sounds good to me." She stood giving him a smile, "And it has plenty of space for Daisy, the van, and the bike."
"That's where we'll go then. Once this damn bridge is finished." He gave her a kiss.
A/N: Be sure to let me know what you guys think! :)
