Chapter Four: Actions Have Consequences

Note: Tossing a little warning at the start of this, usually my chapters do not go into a lot of graphic details but I just couldn't make the emotions right without describing what was happening. So, there is some typical gore of the show, some swearing, and some aggressive sexual actions in this. Nothing too terrible. But just putting this out there so everyone is aware.

While I was not on board for this stupid thing, I wasn't just going to stay home twiddling my thumbs. I joined Maggie by the vehicles and kissed Daryl with all I had as I watched him and several of our people head towards the compound. Gabriel and Tara are also staying behind, they are standing a few miles away from us with a few of the other vehicles since they all couldn't be so close in case anything went wrong. I paced the length of the parked cars and flipped my knife in smooth circles in the air. I was rubbish with a gun, but I was decent with a knife and the years spent twirling pencils gave me a gift with flipping random objects in the air.

"Kelly, will you stop doing that. You're going to chop a finger off."

"Sorry." I say spinning it one more time and putting it back in the holster at my hip and leaning against the same car Maggie was by holding her gun. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm okay, I trust they can get this done."

"I'm talking about you and a baby."

"Were you in a constant state of nauseousness?" She says with a smile.

"Nah, that went away fairly quickly actually. Hit me really hard at the start. Poor Merle." I say remembering the time I threw up all over the man while we were playing poker back at the prison.

"For a big man he can move pretty fast." Maggie giggled

"And scream like a little girl. I swear he and Daryl eat raw birds but a little vomit and they just panic."

"We're you scared?"

"Yep. I was terrified. I came up with every excuse in the book to not talk about it, your wedding, Rick's health, reenforcing the yard. I didn't want to think about what could happen. Turns out I was worried about the wrong part."

"You know that wasn't your fault, right?"

"I had dreams about her, for months before she was born. Horrible dreams. There was a kid, I knew it was mine, and it always ended the same way. I miss Shayla so much. I hated how I was when she was here. I was so afraid of her, of everything. By the time I sort of had it all together she was gone. I have that guilt that I will carry forever. All Shayla needed was love, and I was too afraid to even give her that." I look up from my feet and look Maggie in the eye. Maggie who had become a very important part of my life, she had filled the friendship hole that T-Dogg had left when he died. "Promise me that you won't make the same mistake I did. Love that baby, love every moment with it. Talk to it, sing, plan a future. Because if you don't and the worse happens, you'll never forgive yourself."

"I already love my baby. And Glenn is so happy. I don't think I could feel any other way about them than I do now." She scoots a little closer to me and grabs my hand in a gentle squeeze. "It'll be your turn again soon."

Our quiet moment was ruined by the blaring of an alarm that was obviously coming from the base. Maggie and I sprung away from each other, Maggie reaching for her guns and I grab my knife and scan the tree line for half a second before Maggie takes off in the direction of the base. "They're in trouble."

"Maggie! Wait!" I say as I quickly catch up with her and pull her to a stop."

"I have to go help! This was my trade."

"I know, but we need to do this smart not stupid. You go running in there you might make things worse. Just slow down. We'll go together."

Maggie nods her head and calms down as we walk towards the base, it doesn't take the alarms long to stop blaring, but as we get to the fence line of the base there is nothing but gunfire. "Guess Rick's stealth mission was a failure." I say as we duck down outside the fence, trying to see if we were actually needed.

"Jesus." Maggie says pointing to the left, I also see headlights of the van that was supposed to take the Hilltop people back drive away. Jesus slips into the base as Maggie and I walk a little closer, making it inside the fence as the gunfire seems to draw back into silence. Nothing comes from inside. No guns, no shouting, just silence as the sun rises over the trees. The door opens just as Tara and Gabriel come up from the trees and our radio crackles to life saying they were coming out.

Maggie and I both let out the breaths we had been holding in watching the doors open as everyone who went in were coming out. Seeing Rick, Daryl, and Merle step into the sun had me doubling over in relief and as soon as they lowered their guns I took off as fast as I could right into Daryl's arms. Not caring that he was covered in sweat, blood, and was probably so tired I could knock him down. He wrapped his arms tight around me and mumbles that he was okay as I tried not to cry as he held me.

Once I was calm, I gave everyone else a quick hug, but then I spotted that Abraham was holding his arm. I walk over to him, flipping open my bag that hung over my shoulder. "Let me see."

"Just a scratch." He says as he shrugs off his jacket. I pull it away from his arm and was grateful to his aversion to wearing shirts with sleeves. The injury wasn't deep, but it was long. He can't hold back a hiss as I dump some alcohol over the bleeding cut and wipe it down. I use butterfly strips to pull it together before wrapping it in gauze.

"There, should be okay soon, if it starts to bleed, we might have to stitch part of it."

"I'll be sure not to let you know. Your stitches are awful." He grunts as he pulls his jacket back on as Heath and Tara drive off in one of the Saviors' RVs. I look around and see Rick and Michonne talking by the fence, Daryl and Merle were talking as well, everyone else were standing around, maybe processing what they had done.

A loud engine sound cuts through the quiet and everyone turns towards it to see a man on a motorcycle trying to drive away.

"Son of a bitch!" Daryl yells as Rosita and several others open fire in the man's general direction, it takes half a second before the man flies off the bike and Daryl is on top of him, giving him a few punches to the face. The rain starts to fall out of nowhere as everyone rushes over to Daryl. His voice is loud and harsh, scary in a way I hated hearing.

"Where'd you get the bike?" Daryl yells, pinning the man harshly to the ground. That's when I look at it and realize it was Daryl's bike, the one that had been stolen from the man he tried to help in the woods.

Rick walks up to the man and calmly points his python at the man's head.

"Just do it! Like you did everyone else, right?" The guy yells, something making his voice gurgle as he speaks. It was probably blood.

"Your friends are dead." Rick says in a calm voice. Totally opposite from Daryl's emotion filled yelling when he tackled the man to the ground.

Sometimes even I forget how dangerous Daryl and my brother could be.

"No one's coming for ya. So, you might as well talk." Rick tilts his head a little, I cross my arms at how much this whole situation was unnerving me.

"Gonna ask you one last time how'd you get the bike?"

"We found it." He spits out.

"Like hell you did!" Daryl yells, throwing another punch.

"We found it. Just sitting in the woods."

"Was Negan in that building last night" Rick asks, dropping to his haunches, getting his gun closer to the man's head.

The man starts to laugh, I pull my shoulders tighter as the little splatters of blood fly up from his mouth as he does. "I'm Negan, shithead. There's a whole world of fun that we can talk about, so let's have a chat."

"I'm sorry it had to come to this." Rick says, before he pulls the trigger without hesitation. I jump and close my eyes as the gunshot seems to echo all around me.

*/*/*/*/*/*

I hold tight to Daryl's waist as we speed back to Alexandria on his bike. He was so tense, pulled tight like a guitar string that could snap at any moment. He hadn't told me much about when his bike was stolen, I also knew not to ask him about it with how he reacted every time I had tried to broach the subject with him in the past. I press myself closer to his back as he guns the engine and we speed fast past the other cars that we had taken to the base.

We didn't go back to Alexandria like I had thought we were. Instead, we went to this other neighborhood that was several miles west that had been cleared of supplies for several months now. We stop at a house and Daryl drags me off the bike and into this random house, slamming the door shut behind us.

He does a quick sweep of the house, making sure it was clear before he drags me into his arms and presses a searing kiss to my lips. Spinning us and pushing me back against the wall. I gasp and grab at his sides at his actions and soon his is forcing my jacket down my arms. This wasn't the first time we had gone at each other a bit rough after an intense fight or a moment where adrenaline was high, but Daryl had also not been quite this forceful before. I heard and felt my clothes rip in his hands as his lips moved down to my neck, sucking and biting at the skin.

"Daryl. Wait, slow down." I say as I try to push him back.

"Need you." He growls under his breath, popping the buttons on my jeans and shoving his hand inside.

"Daryl, wait, please, just hold on." I say, my voice shaking, not liking the forceful way he was acting. He never manhandled me, but that was all he had done since Rick shot that guy. Grabbing my wrist and dragging me to the bike, dragging to be this neighborhood, into this house.

It was too similar to what had happened to me in the past.

"Just relax." He says biting at my shoulder as he tried to wedge his leg between mine, his hand still trying to push my underwear aside.

"Damn it Daryl I said stop!" I say as I force my hands to shove him back. He doesn't move very far, maybe half an inch, but it does seem to snap him out of it. He quickly pulls back, gripping his hair tight in his hands, swearing as he turns his back to me, before punching the wall beside me. I jump back from where his fist is still connected to the wall.

I button my jeans back and pull my jacket back over my shoulders and looking at the mess that Daryl was at the moment.

"Daryl." I say as I reach a hand over and lay it on his back, he pulls away from me, his actions rough and jerky before he turns and looks at me, his eyes red and looking so sad.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean- I would never-." He keeps cutting himself off and his eyes dart from me to the floor and back.

"Let's just sit down, okay?" I say, motioning to the couch that was in the room. He nods and sits as far from me as he can. "What's going on? I understand wanting to go a bit rough after what happened, but that. That's not you."

"I'm sorry. I…I'm so angry. It wasn't pretty Kelly. What we did in there. Those people. Then that fucker on my bike. I was trying to help those people and they robbed me for my trouble. I wanted to beat his face in. Then he says Negan." Daryl cuts himself off with a bitter laugh. I scoot closer to him and carefully, take his hand in mine.

"Talk to me Daryl. I can't make this better if I don't know what happened." I say, reaching in my pocket and pulling out a bandana I used to pull my hair back if I was in the pantry and wipe the sweat and dirt from his face.

"You'd never look at me the same if you knew what we did in there."

"I've seen you kill before."

"Not like this. They were most were sleeping; I killed a guy that was just brushing his damn teeth." He lets out another dark laugh. "It's one thing to kill a guy who is coming at you, awake, alert. But to kill someone so helpless. There were maybe 50 people in there. You were right, we could have waited, we could have done more."

"It's over now. You can't go back and undo what you did. You did what you all set out to do, you killed Negan. Now the Hilltop can give us food. I don't agree with what you did Daryl, but I will never look at you differently than I always have. I love you. And I would love you if you had to do this again."

Daryl looks up at me, his eyes not as hard or deep as they had been before. He moves forward slowly, allowing me time to pull away, before he presses his lips to mine again. This time he is softer in his actions, more like he usually was. He pulls back just enough to where when he moved his lips they brush against mine. "I'm sorry, I never meant to hurt you."

"It's okay." I say pushing back against him, just wanting to comfort him. He was shaken in a way I hadn't seen before.

"No, it's not." He pulls back before I straddle his lap and wrap my arms around his head and neck, pulling him into a tight hug, brushing his hair back from his eyes as he wraps his arms around my middle.

"Shh." I say as I hold him a little tighter as he shivers in my arms. "I promise it's okay. It'll be okay."

*/*/*/*/*/*

Emotions are still raw when we emerge from the house several hours later. I had several new bruises that had been sucked into my neck that I was going to have a fun time trying to hide when we got back and I was going to have to ice and rub down Daryl's shoulder for a few days, but he was calmer now. As I held on to his middle as we drove back home, he was looser in his posture, he was just tired now.

He parked the bike right outside the house when we got there, saying he would mess with it tomorrow as he helped me off the bike and we went inside. Rick and the kids were in the living room when we got back and I sent Daryl upstairs to take a shower and I went to the kitchen to get some water. I was gulping it down when Rick came over to me and sat in the chairs at the island.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, went for a ride, Daryl was happy to have his bike back."

"Looks like you got chewed on by an animal." He says motioning at my back.

"He was really happy to have his bike back."

"Then why do you both look so miserable?"

"We're okay Rick. Promise. Just…don't make him go on any runs for a few days okay? Maybe anyone who was at the base, just keep them close for a few days."

"Are you okay?" He asks, grabbing my hand from across the counter. "I know you didn't want that to happen."

"It's done Rick, lets just let it go. Move on. Enjoy the fresh food that will be coming our way. I'm gonna take some water to Daryl." I let go of Rick's hand and press a kiss to his cheek as I walk up the stairs.

*/*/*/*/*/*

The next few days pass in relative peace. Daryl fixes his bike up, we go on a few rides, Denise and I switch off keeping an eye on the pantry and the meds. Mainly I spend my days with Merle in the woods as I gather more plants for the coming winter and nights curled up close to Daryl who has made it his private mission to keep me as close to him as possible.

He didn't have the patience I needed when looking for plants in the woods like Merle did which is why he came with me, plus Merle was determined to teach me to shoot and his teaching style was very different than Daryl's and while I still couldn't shoot well, I could probably hit the broad side of a barn now. And Rick still needed Daryl around since he was essentially second-in-command.

I was in the garage that held all the food and I was drying out the plants and herbs I had found when Denise walked in and frowned so hard I could hear is across the room. "What's up?"

"I feel like every time I look at our med supply it gets smaller." She says as she looks at the clipboard.

"That's because we haven't had much luck on that end when we scavenge. That's why I'm bringing in all these plants. We'll need something to get us through if sickness hits this place."

"I know they hit all the pharmacies in the area…maybe they can find another cul-de-sac?"

"Go look at the map." I say as I point over to the collection of local maps that on a shelf by the door. The area's that had been cleared were marked in red.

"Maybe I can find something."

"Well, let me know. Merle and I are heading out once the sun is up a bit more." I turn back to the mess of jars, labels, and leaves that litter the counter that I had claimed as mine. There wasn't too much more I could do at the moment so I filled out the chart and smiled at Denise as I walked by.

Daryl is on the porch of an empty house that he had been using to house his bike since it had a driveway and a garage. "Hey." I say dropping a kiss on his cheek as I sit down next to him, leaning my hard on his shoulder. "How's it coming?"

"Good, no major damage done. Should be perfect soon."

"That mean you're gonna let me drive again?"

"Maybe. But we'll stay inside the gate in case you fall off a break something."

"So, you remember how you were talking about us getting a place of our own." I say, smiling as he snaps his head up and looks at me.

"Yeah."

"Well, I've done some thinking too, and if we do get pregnant again there really isn't a lot of room where we are now." I look at the house behind us. "And this place just happens to be on the market and has three bedrooms. And I don't think we can beat the price."

"You serious?"

"Yeah. You're right. I can't keep using Rick's past health issues stop us from growing. And since Michonne has basically moved all her stuff in the place is a little crowded."

"Alright, looks like we're moving." He smiles at me and drops his tools in the box and pulls me closer to him with his grease covered hand for a kiss. "Let's get packing." He says as he stands up, pulling me to my feet with him.

We spend the rest of the day moving our things from the tiny room in Rick's house to our new, much larger master room in our new house. The family that had occupied it before were an elderly couple who had passed when the walkers had breached the walls, the furniture had been left in the houses of the dead since we didn't have much storage for things like couches in Alexandria, so the biggest thing we had to move was our bed from Rick's and the bed from this house out. I didn't want to sleep in a bed that was in the master bedroom.

Night fell as I stood in the kitchen and stirred the deer meat around in the pan and trying to get the bread to rise in the oven. Daryl was moving some stuff around in the garage, making sure his bike was locked up safe and sound. It couldn't help but laugh at how domestic the whole thing was. This would be the first time Daryl and I were totally alone in this type of setting. We had always had someone close by or directly underfoot.

I pulled two plates from the shelf and spooned the gravy deer meat over the bread and set the plates at the table and called Daryl in for dinner. We sat down and started eating and I just stared at the man across from me with a smile.

"What?"

"Nothing, just enjoying being able to stare at you as much as I want without Carl insulting me or something. It's a great view."

"Keep looking at me like that and this food you worked so hard on will go to waste. Which I am not going to let happen since it is not often, we get fresh meat around here."

"Maybe that's my goal, get you to do something you don't plan on doing."

"Nope, food first. Then we'll get to doing what people do in a new house."

After dinner we snuggled on the couch, wrapped in an old blanket that looked similar to the poncho Daryl used to have. It was quiet for once, usually we had Judith crying or Carl playing ball or someone visiting Rick. I let out a sigh and close my eyes when Daryl presses a kiss to the top of my head. "Marry me?" he asks quietly.

I pull back and look up at him. "What?"

"Will you marry me?"

I blink at him a few times, shocked at his words. We had only talked about marriage once in our whole relationship and it was when we were heading North out of Georgia, I think we were just over the North Carolina boarder and Daryl made a comment about having a wife and a kid. Then we had lost Shayla and the topic just never came up again.

"What brought this on?" I ask confused.

"Will you just answer the damn question. Will you marry me?" He says sitting fully up on the couch and reaching into his vest pocket and pulling out a silver band with swirls engraved along the metal.

"Yes, yes of course I'll marry you." I say with a smile breaking across my face.

"Good." He says as he takes my hand and slides the ring over my finger. It's a bit loose and dented but it was from Daryl and it was beautiful.

*/*/*/*/*/*

We were sitting in the garage a few days later, I was handing Daryl tools as he fiddled with something on the side of his bike when Denise and Rosita walked up, Denise had a map in her hands and Rosita had a slightly annoyed look in her eyes. She seems to only have two moods these days, since her and Abraham had called it quits, annoyed and pissed off. Turns out Denise had looked at the maps like I suggested and had found an apothecary not too far Alexandria.

"After I got out of DC, I just drove. I remember seeing it right when I realized I had no idea where I was going." She says as she hands Daryl the map. "Edison's Apothecary and Boutique. It's just this little gift shop in a strip mall, but if it's really an apothecary, they had drugs."

"How do you know they still have them?" I ask, "It's been a long time since you got out of DC."

"It isn't that far. I just wanna check. And you and Rosita aren't out scavenging or pulling shifts."

"We'll go." Daryl says looking at Rosita, he knew Merle and I were going out into woods for him to hunt and me to find more plants.

"I wanted to check." Denise says, her voice hardening a little more than I was used to hearing. "I just wanted to help."

"How much time you spend out there?" Daryl asks, folding the map up.

"None."

"Forget it.

"I can ID the meds. I know how to use a machete now. I've seen roamers up close. I'm ready." Denise insists, her posture changing up to stand a bit straighter, she was determined it seemed.

"You good with this?" Daryl asks Rosita and she firmly says that she is not okay with any part of this.

"I'll go alone, if I have to."

"You'll die alone."

"I'm asking you to make sure I don't."

"I'm not babysitting her by myself." Rosita says which causes Daryl to let out a defeated huff and tells them both to meet him by the truck in ten minutes. He shakes his head as Denise almost skips away from us.

"You really think it's a good idea taking her out there?" I ask as I help gather his loose tools from the garage floor as he gathers his extra ammo from the locker that now held his personal stash.

"Nope, but you gotta start somewhere I guess. Rosita will be there, shouldn't be too hard."

"Just be careful."

"You too, don't let my dip-shit of a brother get you into any trouble."

"You're just pissy I got the girl to shoot." Merle's loud voice rings in the air as he walks over to us.

"She still can't shoot worth shit."

"Hey, I'm standing right here."

"Truth hurts." Daryl leans over and kisses me, pats Merle on the shoulder as he walks away.

"Where is he going?"

"Last minuet run to some drug store a town over. You ready?"

"Yep, let's go see what animals I can kill today. Spare them the indignity of starving to death since you are stealing all of their food."

"Just some of their food." I say as we walk out of the garage, I pull the door down and jog a bit to catch up with Merle who didn't stop when I did.

*/*/*/*/*/*

My bag wasn't as full as it had been on trips in the past, but we were venturing into parts of the woods we had already been in, but Merle had found tracks of some sort. He had managed to get a few birds, the small birds were annoying to skin, but meat was meat and we didn't get meat very often, even with the trades from the Hilltop coming in now. We found a few walkers and I was please to discover that rust that I had been dealing with a few weeks ago was basically gone now, I was back to being able to rip my knife out of a walker head with very little struggle.

"So, how are things going at the new love nest?"

"Thought we couldn't talk while tracking?"

"We're still pretty far from it, I think it's a racoon anyways. Stupid thing will be burrowed down this time of day."

"Too bad Rick did have us go to Louisiana, gator is delicious. Much better than raccoon."

"Can't beat BBQ raccoon."

"Rosita said the same thing about rats, ever tried that one?"

"No, but BBQ makes everything taste better so maybe it is worth trying."

"So gross."

"Says the girl who likes alligator."

"Shark is good too."

We walk for several miles then Merle holds his hand up and I automatically drop down on my haunches as he crouches down into the growth at our feet, his eyes squinting a bit as he scans the area around us. He hands me the pistol he always has me practice with and motions for me to follow him. I step where he steps, trying to be a quiet as him, soon a man comes into view, his bright red hair familiar enough that I relax my shoulders. Merle rustles something at his feet and Abraham spins around, gun raised. Once he sees it's us he lowers his gun and motions us over to him.

"Bunch of assholes took Eugene. Waiting until I get a clear chance to take them out."

"How many?"

"Seen around eight, maybe nine."

"How did they get Eugene?"

"He ran his damn mouth and I left him to find his own way home. Says my services are no longer required and he get his ass kidnapped an hour later."

"The whole point of silently following a group of assholes with guns is to do it silently." Merle hisses at the two of us. Merle and Abraham spread out a little, I stick close to Merle and we follow the group of people that I still wasn't seeing in the trees but the other two were.

A few yards, maybe more Abraham signals for us to stop and when I drop down, I hear a voice, a female voice, it's not loud enough for me to really hear the words, but she is talking fast somewhere ahead of us. Abraham slowly walks forward, motioning for Merle to follow him. Merle turns and looks at me, his eyes hard as he fixes me with a look. "Follow me, but the moment I point my gun at anything you drop. Got me?" All I do is nod and we take off again.

The voice gets louder as we get closer, then it just suddenly stops. A louder voice, male this time, yells "You drop 'em now!"

We get just behind the clearing when the group comes into view. A group of men who looked a lot like the people that had been at the base several weeks ago are holding guns at Daryl, Rosita, and Eugene who was on his knees. Merle reaches out and squeezes my shoulder when he heard my breath hitch, warning me to stay quiet. I nod and slowly drop as low as I can.

I can see Merle and Abraham looking for cover options, they're pointing and somehow communicating with now words in a way that I never understood when situations like this came up. But as long as they understood it then it was all good.

"You got something to say to me? You gonna clear the air? Step up on that high horse? No. You don't talk much." I pop my head up a little, trying to see who this man was talking too, but I really didn't have a great vantage point. "Still getting the hang of her. Kicks like a bitch, but-." He is cut off by a low, gruff voice that I knew was Daryl, but I couldn't hear exactly what he said, and apparently neither could the man, since he asked Daryl to repeat himself.

"I should've killed you."

Abraham moves behind some oil barrels off to the side as Merle hides behind a tree on the other side. I creep over on Abraham's side since there was more cover and I gripped the pistol tighter in my hand. The tension in the air hung thick between the trees. Then man's voice swims back into focus in my ears.

"I'm sorry, darlin', I didn't catch your name. I'm D, or Dwight. You can call me either. So? What's your name?"

"Rosita. What do you want?"

"Well, Rosita it's not what I want. It's what you and Daryl are going to do. You're going to let us into your little complex. It looks like it's just beautiful in there. And then you're going to let us take whatever and whoever we want or we blow Eugene's brains out. And then yours. And then his. I hope it doesn't come to that, really. Nobody else has to die. We just try and start with one. You know maximum impact to get our point across. So, what's it gonna be? You tell me."

"You wanna kill someone, you start with our companion hiding over there behind the oil barrels." My jaw drops at Eugene's words, was he purposefully trying to make sure his butt didn't get saved? "He's a first-class a-hole and he deserves it so much more than us three."

"Go check it out."

Before I even know what is going on there is a harsh scream from what I could see was Dwight, then all hell broke loose, gunfire echoing fast and loud in the clearing around the tracks. I push myself to my feet and rush further to the left, away from where the back half of the larger group were. I come to an abrupt halt as a walker stumbles into my path, I let out a short scream before raising my gun and firing a shot, annoyed when it grazes the top of the head. I drop the gun and pull my knife out, stabbing it clean between the eyes. Picking the pistol back up and make it to the tracks as a voice yells "Fall back! Fall back!"

Chapter Four!

Next time Daryl and Kelly deal with the fallout of Denise's death, Alexandria makes minor preparations, Rick is in denial, and Negan will make an appearance.

I always enjoy comments, helpful criticism, and tolerance for all the typos in this.

Thank you all for reading!

Maxy