[A/N: It's taking me longer than i would like to get new chapters up. Sorry about that. Hope some of you readers are still hanging in there!]

At some point, Gorman let up on the pressure on her neck and she was able to choke in a breath. She swam hazily, reluctantly, back towards consciousness, in no rush to get back to the pains of the body and heart she could sense waiting for her.

There were voices nearby.

'Got a thing for blondes Gorman?' said one, a nasal, almost hungry whine. 'This mean we get the other one now?'

'You get her when I'm done,' Gorman snapped. 'And I've got some plans that might involve the both of them.'

Her vision cleared slowly, and she caught a glimpse of a sharp faced man with a dark greasy ponytail who had fallen in beside Gorman, a disgruntled expression on his face.

Her pains were all right where she'd left them - cheekbone and skull pulsing white heat and the rest of her body throbbing with her cracked rib and a litany of other aches.

She barely registered any of them.

Daryl.

Oh god, Daryl.

She retched, and Gorman exclaimed disgustedly and thrust her to the ground to paint the concrete floor as her body rebelled.

Her stomach seemed to heave forever, but eventually she wheezed, eyes streaming, and spat the last of the blood and the bile from her mouth.

'Not sure i see the attraction in this one,' Gorman's rat faced companion said in his nasal whine. 'But I sure will be happy to take the other one off your hands.'

'You get her when I say and not before,' Gorman snarled, then his hand was in Asha's hair twisting up. 'And the attraction in this one is the million pieces i am going to break her into.'

Asha ignored that last part.

Other one?

The other blonde.

The car with the cross.

Beth…

That little spark of hope fluttered back to life.

'Looks broken already,' rat face said dismissively.

'Oh no,' Gorman said, twisting the hand in her hair so she had to look at him. 'She's taking the death of her boyfriend a little hard right now is all.' His face suddenly leered in close to hers. 'But it'll just be fuel to the fire, hey Asha.'

Asha said nothing, hatred for Gorman running so deep that she felt that if she could physically tap in to it she'd be able to set the world on fire with a single thought. A little of that must have shown in her eyes because Gorman grinned.

'That's what i thought,' he said. 'You couldn't give up the fight if you wanted to.'

He hauled her to her feet again.

Hand still twisted in her hair, she saw nothing but ceiling as he dragged her along for long moments, down a corridor and then into a space that opened up like a factory floor until they crossed to the far side.

'Get that door open,' Gorman barked, and there was a clunk of keys and a creak and they passed through a door in the far wall. Gorman let go of her and she rubbed her head, getting a brief glance at what looked like it had once been a small open plan office for a handful of people before she was bustled up a narrow stairway and through another locked door at the top.

The first floor once would have been an executive office, with exposed wooden rafters and generously sized glass windows overlooking the factory floor. Cheap venetian blinds were open to let in the light. It had been converted into a combined living-sleeping space, with a bed and a lounge and a collection of scattered belongings that made her think she was in Gorman's residence - even though it wasn't the space he'd occupied when she'd lived at Terminus.

She took it all in at a glance, stumbling as Gorman shoved her a few paces through the door. She blinked and rubbed her neck, scoping the exists, noticing only the door they'd entered by, another that looked likely to be a storeroom and the windows with the factory ground a floor heights drop below.

'So where's this other blonde?' she asked.

'What, disappointed you're not the only object of my affection?'

'Crushed.'

'No need. I've got plenty of affection to go around.' He circled round behind her and then suddenly licked her up the side of the cheek, leaving a trail of sour smelling slime. He grinned at his buddy as Asha shuddered and gagged slightly.

She almost wished she'd brought up more bile so she could spit it in his face.

'Besides, I think you'll like her,' Gorman continued. 'Sweet little thing. Reckon she'll bring out that big sister aspect of our personality.'

Asha did something she never did and deliberately thought about what she'd done to the men who'd taken Ren. She drew the knowledge out of the deep place she buried it and let it shine out of her eyes. 'Maybe it will.'

Gorman leant back, eyes narrowed.

Before he could speak, the door they'd entered through banged open and a small woman with grey-shot dark hair, round glasses and pinched lips entered unannounced. She was making a cursory effort to wipe blood off her hands with an already bloody cloth and looked Gorman and his companion over with barely contained irritation.

Gorman straightened slightly. 'Miriam,' he acknowledged almost respectfully. 'What can i do for you?'

'Gareth wants you. Don't start,' she said immediately as Gorman opened his mouth. 'It's something to do with boundary security, so it's squarely in your patch of responsibility.'

Gorman bit down on his response with obvious frustration. His jaw tightened and he did his best to force a calm tone. 'You don't know what it's about?'

'No,' Miriam snapped. 'And I don't appreciate being pushed into the role of messenger. I have better things to do.'

She glanced at Asha, a malevolent little twist to her lips, before giving her hands a final wipe and shaking out the red cloth.

Not a cloth.

A bandana. One Asha had often seen trailing from Daryl's back pocket. One that had wiped blood and tears from her own face more than once.

Her knees weakened, and she saw a gleam of satisfaction in the wicked little woman's eyes before Gorman grasped her by the back of the neck.

'Gonna be back for you real soon,' he murmured in her ear, before hurling her through the storeroom door rat face had just opened.

Hands up, she stumbled into the far wall of the small room, door slamming behind her. The lock clunked solidly and was followed by the sound of retreating footsteps.

She pulled a couple of shuddering breaths, pushing away the image of Daryl's bloody bandana as the darkness closed in on her, stealing the air out of her lungs. Hands pressed against the wall, she struggled to get her breathing back under control.

The windowless room stank of musty air and piss and stale sweat, but blessedly not of metal. Asha stood very still, wary, anticipating from Gorman and his friend's conversation that she wasn't alone.

There was a faint sound, a shuffle, from across the room.

She wasn't sure what would be worse - if it was Beth trapped in this hell hole or if it wasn't.

'Is there someone in here,' she asked softly.

There was no response, but as her eyes adjusted to the faint light filtering in through the crack under the door, she could see a huddled shape in the corner furthest from the door.

'I'm just gonna sit down if that's alright by you. That bastard hit me in the head and I'm feeling a bit dizzy.'

A shadow that might have been a face turned fractionally in her direction as she slid gingerly to the floor.

'You shouldn't be here.'

The voice was tiny but instantly recognisable. Asha closed her eyes, swallowing the lump in her throat.

Beth.

Beth's hunched over shape had contracted in on herself and was rocking back and forth. 'Shouldn't be here,' she whispered again. 'Shouldn't be here. He's gonna kill me. Just like Joni.'

Asha shuffled slightly towards the far corner. 'Who's Joni,' she asked softly.

'Me,' Beth whispered brokenly and started weeping quietly.

Asha edged closer.

'Bethy, do you know who I am?'

Beth jerked at the sound of her name and started shaking.

'I dreamed you up.'

'No, I'm here.'

Asha extended a hand. And after a moment Beth reached a tentative hand out almost against her will, but it hovered well short of making contact.

'I really am here Beth.'

There was half a sob, and rapid scampering noise and then Beth was pressed against her side, sobbing into her shoulder.

'I'm so sorry Asha. I was so desperate for you and Daryl to find me. It's my fault you're here.'

'Shush.' Asha wrapped an arm around her, ignoring the smell, and held her for long minutes as she sobbed herself out.

'How did you find me?' Beth asked eventually, wiping a hand across her nose.

'Luck as much as anything. We followed you as far as we could, but we lost trail. But then we found Rick and Michonne and Carl, and they were on their way here. They'd found signs for Terminus on the rail line. We thought some of our people might have seen similar signs and been here too.'

'Wait. Asha you're from Terminus.' Beth pushed hard against her, scrabbling quickly backwards. Both hands went to her mouth. 'How could you?' she accused.

Asha's brows furrowed. 'These aren't my people Beth. Most of them are new and the ones that were here before are different now.'

The whites were showing around Beth's eyes as she stared at her in horror

'You eat people.'

Asha recoiled, going cold all over. 'What?'

Beth wrapped her hands around her knees and started rocking. 'They eat people she whispered. They eat them. It's what going to happen to us. You, me, Daryl …all of us.'

'You don't know that's what they're doing,' Asha attempted to placate her. 'Gorman was probably just trying to scare you.'

'No,' Beth hissed furiously. 'It's real. He brought some in. There was still a hand attached to it. He carved it up and made me watch him eat it.' She looked away, whole body shaking and her voice was full of horror. 'It's the only thing they bring me to eat. I tried to fight him, about the meat and..everything, but…I couldn't. He's so much stronger than me.'

Beth was curled in on herself, distress written in every line of her body. Asha swallowed her horror at what Beth had revealed and reached for the younger woman.

'Shush now. You've done what you need to survive. That's all.' She could suddenly smell metal again. She wrapped an arm around Beth and pulled her in, the young woman still shaking uncontrollably. 'Sometimes the only smart thing to do is to survive to fight another day. Whatever that takes.'

Comprehension of Beth's suffering slowly started to penetrate Asha's own pain, and her anger coalesced into something cold and heavy in her belly. She smoothed Beth's hair back from forehead. 'Don't blame yourself for anything you've had to do to survive Beth, blame him. If anything, you praise yourself, because you have survived, and we will fight him I promise you.'

There was a hiccuping noise against her shoulder.

'I know he's hurt you Bethy,' Asha said after a moment, voice like ice. 'But I need you to think. Anything, any habit, routine he has, something that might help me kill him.'

Hours later, at least, Asha sat in the darkness. Beth was curled up beside her, sleeping or resting. Asha envied her either way.

She watched her hands flexing and clenching in her lap, struggling a little to breathe through the tightness in her chest, ignoring the tears sliding steadily down her cheeks.

She tried not to think of him, of the bloody cloth in that woman's hands. She hadn't had the heart to tell Beth, or to mention her dad's wrist watch or the poncho.

Why get her hopes up?

Why give her the fear that the meat she'd eaten was someone she knew?

She glanced at Beth, clearly fragile and folded in on herself despite being barely discernible in the dark.

She was going to kill Gorman.

Her hands stretched and contracted. She imagined wrapping them around his throat and squeezing, but his pig neck was so thick it would be difficult for her to exert enough pressure.

Beth hadn't had much to offer in the way of useful information, it sounded as though she'd spent most of the days since her capture in this small dark space, Gorman only letting her out when he felt like playing.

He did make her wash beforehand though, with a bucket of water and soap that he brought up to the room. No doubt to wash away the stale stench of the storeroom. Asha wondered if there was something in that she could use.

Maybe she could drown him in the bucket?

It was a pleasant fantasy and, after all, desperation could make a weapon of anything.

She snarled suddenly to herself in the darkness, a cold sense of certainty settling in her belly she realised that at least some of Gorman's plans would involve him being right up close against her. Closer than Joe had been to Rick.

Her teeth were just as sharp as Rick's.

She balled her hands tight into fists and kept them there. She was going to kill him.

The minutes oozed by slowly in the darkness, until her jaw and her hands hurt from being clenched so tightly. She shook them out, stretching her neck from side to side. Her pounding head was begging her to lay down and rest, but she was wholly unwilling to give into the vulnerability of sleep in this place.

She had to be ready when Gorman came back

And she couldn't face closing her eyes and seeing Daryl bleeding on the ground.

Anything but that.

More time passed. A minute? Five? An hour? It was impossible to tell, and then finally there was the creak of the stair and heavy footsteps in the room.

Beth bolted upright, eyes wide and scrambled backwards on her hands and bottom to the furthest recess of the room.

Asha knelt, eye to the ground, peering under the door but could only see shadows shifting as the footsteps moved around the room. Then the light was blocked and a key whispered into the lock.

She crouched on hands and knees, one heel planted against the wall behind her. A heavy click, and the door swung inwards.

She sprang, propelling herself off the wall and into the indistinct shadow outlined in the blinding light of the doorway. She hit him in the middle of the chest and they went down together, air whooshing out of her lungs as her ribcage flared and she lost her grip in the burst of pain.

Something solid drove between her shoulder blades and her arms were twisted behind her. Gasping, she was hauled up and dumped unceremoniously into a hard wooden chair.

Gareth rubbed an elbow as he got up from the ground and sat down in the chair he'd arranged facing her own. There was a steaming plate of meat on the side table beside him.

'That was dumb Asha,' Gareth said. 'I expected better of you. Tie her up properly so we don't have to deal with any more of that crap.'

Finally getting some air in her lungs, she glanced over her shoulder. Marcus' sandy hair fell over his wire framed glasses and there was an intense look of concentration in his eyes as he twisted a length of rope around her hands behind the back of the chair. The rope tightened and he stood back, the same wiry, endurance runner's build that Asha remembered, and leant against the storeroom wall.

'Sorry about the knee in the back,' he said, without sounding particularly apologetic.

'Bite me,' she snarled, testing the ropes without much hope, certain Marcus had tied them with the same precision he applied to everything.

'Although I guess I can hardly blame you for trying to launch an attack on Gorman,' Gareth chuckled and Asha turned her attention to him. 'He certainly does have that effect on people.'

'Come to have a run at me before he gets a chance?'

'No. Gorman and my proclivities don't run in the same direction.'

'Unless you're here to let me out, I don't have anything to say to you.'

'Maybe I am.'

Asha's eyes narrowed. 'Meaning what exactly?'

Gareth ignored her question. 'Why didn't you come back?'

'To all this? How could you stay here after what happened.'

'What happened here… It was a lesson we had to learn. And we learnt it, we heard the message loud and clear and we changed the way we needed to.'

Asha shook her head in disbelief. 'I thought I'd lost my way after what happened here, but this…' She glanced over her shoulder to include Marcus in her rebuke. 'And you don't even see how lost you are.'

'We're not lost. We know exactly where we stand. In this world, you're either the butcher or the cattle.'

'You're eating people.' Her voice was thick with revulsion

'I see Gorman's pet has told you about our dietary practices. That's remarkably forthcoming of her. Wait…' He frowned thoughtfully. 'What was the archer's name again? D-. Something starting with D.' He leant forward grinning. 'You know her. We knew she was with others at the house. She told us their names were Ashley and Darren, but it was you. Asha and…' He snapped his fingers.

'Daryl,' Marcus supplied.

'Daryl.' Gareth laughed out loud. 'That is too brilliant. Gorman is going to lose his mind when he learns it was you that just slipped through his fingers at that honey pot.'

Asha had flinched at hearing Daryl's name, closing her eyes against the sudden spring of tears - but a swell of rage built in her belly as she listened to Gareth chortle to himself.

'You're taking Alex's death well', Asha said snidely. She gestured with her head towards the plate of steaming meat. 'That him?'

Amusement washed from Gareth's face as though he'd been doused with cold water.

'There's no excuse for wastefulness,' he said seriously.

'And yet you wasted Daryl,' she hissed.

'Not exactly.'

Asha glanced at the plate in horror. 'No,' she whispered.

Gareth laughed. 'Oh no. I'm not that sadistic. I wouldn't serve him up for you to eat, not as your first meal anyway. But the plate probably will be his fate.'

Probably?

Asha hated the flurry of hope that sparked unbidden to life. Gareth was just playing with her. She snarled. 'Marcus doesn't miss.'

'I don't,' the marksman agreed in an uninvolved tone.

Gareth was grinning. 'Marcus didn't take the shot.'

Asha jerked involuntarily.

'I didn't,' Marcus agreed again.

'Marcus is one of mine,' Gareth said. 'Wouldn't shoot without my order. One of Gorman's men took the shot. His aim is average at best.'

'Don't.' Asha felt tears leaking despite her best efforts. 'I saw him go down.'

'Look at you,' Gareth said, leaning forward with a condescending tilt of his head. 'You really do care.'

She closed her eyes, unable to even talk past the lump in her throat.

'He's not dead Asha.'

Half a sob choked past her lips before she got it under control.

The look on Gareth's face was vaguely amused.

'I saw him go down,' she whispered again.

'He was hit. In the shoulder. Through and through. Under normal circumstances, he'd be fine.'

Asha stared at him, knowing she shouldn't believe him, but unable to entirely quell the hope fluttering in her chest.

'Normal circumstances,' she muttered.

'Well, I'm not wasting a course of antibiotics on him, but we stopped the bleeding. Wouldn't want him dying before we need him to. Lack of refrigeration and the waste factor and all that.'

Gareth was leaning back in his chair with a slight little smile, clearly enjoying watching her struggle with it.

'Why tell me this?' she asked eventually.

'It'll piss Gorman off, when he comes in here to gloat that he's killed your lover.'

Asha seized the opportunity to divert the topic, to buy herself some more time to process the possibility of Daryl's survival. 'Gorman. What is it with you two?'

'We have a hate-hate, but somehow workable relationship.'

'Just which one of you is actually in charge around here?'

'I am. In here. Gorman is scum. Actually he's worse than that, he is stupid and petty minded and that makes him a liability. But he somehow survives on supply runs when others die. He's useful. I give him free reign outside this compound, and with what he finds outside the fences' - Gareth glanced at storeroom door. 'And in here, he follows my rules. More or less. He whines, but he doesn't really want my job.'

'Well, responsibility always been anathema to Gorman.'

Gareth inclined his head in agreement. 'He wants just enough power to make his own life easy. And that makes him controllable. More or less.'

'So where is he?'

'I sent him out with a team to secure the perimeter. Albert's shortcomings had to be addressed in a fairly permanent manner.'

'Leave me your knife and I'll address Gorman's the same way.'

'No. Then you'd be armed and loose and it could be traced back to me. I won't shed any tears if you do kill him, but you're on your own there.'

Asha narrowed her eyes at him. He was too quick with that response. He'd already thought it through. She felt a fingernail of power tilt back in her direction.

'You want me to kill him.'

Gareth shrugged nonchalantly. 'Does it matter if i do? I'm sure you already want to kill him enough for both of us.'

There was that. Asha settled back in the chair trying to think of some way she could wring an advantage from it.

Gareth poked at the plate with a fork. 'This doesn't have to be the archer's fate.'

'It won't be.'

How easily that little spark of hope had taken root.

'We don't eat everyone,' Gareth said. 'Some of them join us. The strong ones, the ones we think are worthy - usually the ones who come in through the backdoor - we give them the choice. I've gotta admit, I thought your group might be one of the ones we offered that choice. It's a choice I'm still willing to offer you.'

He leant forward and stared at her a long moment, heavy calculation in his eyes.

'Kill Gorman,' he said eventually. 'Join us. Convince the archer to join us too if you want. We're the same people Asha. I still play a mean hand of poker and Marcus still spends all his spare time painting.'

Marcus shrugged indifferently in the corner of her vision.

'We just have a slightly different dietary habit,' Gareth finished.

'Just slightly.'

'Just one little change Asha. One little change that keeps us safe. And we're still the same people. We still need strength. You and the archer could be good here.' He gave her a lopsided grin. 'You could be good here together. Especially with Gorman gone.'

'What about the others?'

'Others?'

She leant forward, dragging the chair slightly. 'Rick, Michonne, Carl. Beth. Anyone else from my home that you've got looked in one of those rail cars.'

'No.'

'No?'

'Rick will never bend. That much is obvious and it will be enough of a stretch to convince the others to let the archer come over.'

Gareth speared a piece of meat and took a bite. 'It's just one little change Asha. Mum does a great job on the grill. It just tastes like chicken.' He tilted his head to the side as he chewed. 'Well, maybe a bit tougher than chicken.'

There was a sick feeling in her stomach, and she swallowed hard against the thickening of her throat. Gareth noticed. He put another morsel on the fork and held it out

'Just one little bite and i'll leave you this.' He pulled Daryl's knife from the back of his waistband. 'Couldn't leave you mine, but it's possible that Gorman brought this in to taunt you with. So long as he's dead, who's to know?'

Asha tugged meaningfully on her ropes, hands aching to touch something that had been Daryl's, to have her hands where his had been.

'Oh no,' Gareth said. 'I'll tuck it under the mattress. Has to look like Gorman brought it in and lost it in a struggle. Can't have you launching out of that storeroom with it gripped between your teeth.'

He held the knife in one hand and extended the forkful of meat in the other. 'Just one little bite Asha.'

Her eyes flickered between the two, thinking of the words she'd comforted Beth with. Sometimes the only smart thing is to survive to fight another day, whatever that takes.

That blade could mean the difference between life and death, for her, for Beth, for Daryl. She tried to imagine opening her mouth to the flesh and her mouth was suddenly vomit slick.

The calculating part of her brain told her not to be stupid. Dead was dead. Alex or whoever it was didn't need their flesh and she needed that knife.

She tried again and gagged, retching a thin stream of spit and bile on to the floor.

Gareth's gaze weighed her. 'Is this really that bad?' he asked softly. 'Is it worse than what we endured in those rails cars?'

She spat on the floor, trying to get rid of the taste of bile. 'You act like it's this or nothing.'

'It is.'

'You shouldn't have stayed here. You spent to long staring at those rail cars, you forgot that there was any other way.'

'There is no other way, not to stay strong, safe. Not in this world. If you'd stayed here, you would be doing this too. And you'd be safe because of it.'

'No,' Asha said quietly, sitting back in her chair.

'No?'

'No,' she repeated, wondering whether to be relieved or devastated that she'd finally found a line she wasn't willing to cross, not even for Daryl. Not yet at least. She was realistic enough to admit that after enough time, under enough pressure, eventually she would take that bite.

But she wasn't there yet.

'Do you remember what this place was originally?' she asked. 'Strong, well prepared people are the best defence against what happened to us. You're eating your most valuable asset.' She shook her head again. 'We aren't meat.'

'We only eat the weak,' Gareth said, popping the forkful in his mouth and chewing.

Asha watched stone faced until he finally swallowed.

Then he stood up, sliding Daryl's knife into the back of his jeans.

'I'm disappointed in you Asha,' he said. 'But maybe you'll feel differently about your choices after some time with Gorman. I'm sure he'll be a poignant reminder of those lessons you seem to have forgotten.'

'That rail car didn't break me. What makes you think Gorman will?'

'You're not broken now, that's true. But you endured last time because you had to. You had your brother and sister think of.' Gareth leant in close and there was the shadow of remembered horror in his eyes. 'But I wonder if you really remember how it was at the time Asha? What you would have given, what you would have done, just to make it stop? I don't know Gorman's plans for you exactly, but whatever they are, I doubt he's going to be quick about it. It'll be far too late for the archer by the time he's done.'

Asha stared at him stonily, hands clenched to hide the trembling that had started at his words.

'We're done here,' he said, and Marcus started unbinding her hands.

'Let me give you something to think about whilst you're enjoying Gorman's attentions,' Gareth said as Marcus worked. 'No one will ever take this place from us again.'

Then he nodded and Asha was hauled to her feet and flung back into the storeroom, lock clicking behind her.

'Maybe not,' she whispered as she slumped back against the door. 'But someone will burn it down around your ears.'

God she hoped it would be her.