A/N: The ending scene in this chapter has been planned since DAY 1 but I didn't know how/when it would fit it… however, when I sat down to write this chapter it just popped out of my head and onto the page. I am happy with how it will move the story along so I left it. YOU WILL NOT WANT TO MISS THE NEXT CHAPTER. Bigggggg things coming babies so make sure to follow this story!
Thank you for reading and extra shout out to those who reviewed: headtrip parade, WolfyLeigh, Reignashii, and SilvasPrickle. You all are so sweet, thank you for taking the time to let me know that people are reading. PLEASE review to let me know if people are still interested in seeing where this story leads!
Disclaimer: I do not own or have any rights to the characters/plots of TWD series. I am just a fan exploring the marvelous, macabre world Robert Kirkman created.
/
Chapter 31: First Snow
Michonne and Glenn were back to back in the darkness of their makeshift prison. Her fingers were almost numb from being tied so tightly for so long but she was desperately trying to undo the knots on Glenn's wrists before she lost all feeling in her extremities.
She used what little fingernails she had to try and pry open the ropes.
"Shit," Michonne said in a whisper when she felt warm blood slipping over her hands.
"Was that the last one?" Glenn asked over his shoulder. He must have felt her blood too.
"Yeah," she sighed in defeat. Now that her last fingernail had ripped down to a bloody stump, she was thankful for the fact that she had minimal feeling in her hands.
"You okay?" he asked, concerned as they shifted away from each other.
"Yeah, I'm good," she answered him. Michonne raised her voice loud enough for Abraham and Morgan to hear but quiet enough that any guards outside of their door wouldn't. "These ropes are too tight. What's plan B?"
"We're passed plan B, I think we're up to plan S for Screwed," Abe complained. Their captors had perceived him as the biggest threat after it had required 4 men to take him down, so now there was a thick chain wrapping his torso and arms to the bed post and duct tape keeping his legs immobile too. Needless to say, he was in a bad mood.
"Got any useful ideas Abe or you just going to shouting profanities like you have for the last eight hours?" Glenn asked him.
"I got nothing, man," the red head groused before turning on Morgan. "What about you Dr. Huxtable? Anything to contribute to the group?"
The older man hadn't struggled or come up with any new ideas. After Beth had come in here and punched him, he just sat still with a content smile on his face. "I told ya. We don't need to do anything. Beth will be here soon enough."
Glenn looked sympathetic and Abe groaned. Michonne was curious though, perhaps Morgan was right. From the interactions she'd had with the blonde since Beth had returned, it was clear that the sweet innocent babysitter was long gone. Morgan had spent the last two years on the road alone with Beth and seemed to have profound faith in her. She'd seen crazier things happen so she wasn't going to write Beth off yet.
Glenn and Michonne tried everything they could think of over the next few hours to get free. She had just started to feel her eyelids drooping from exhaustion when shouts outside the cabin woke her up.
The doorknob outside their room started to rattle and adrenaline flooded her system in preparation for a fight. There was a muttered, impatient curse in a gravelly voice she recognized and a few seconds later the door swung open.
Daryl pushed into the cabin and clicked the door closed quietly behind himself. He made quick work of Glenn's ropes and then passed Glenn the knife. Glenn cut Michonne and Morgan free while Daryl got to work picking the padlock that secured Abraham.
Michonne crept over to the door and peaked out. Their guard was slumped on the ground but she could see that he was still breathing, meaning Daryl had only knocked him unconscious. There was a bright glow of orange light across the compound and even from here the smell of smoke burned her nostrils. Michonne dragged the guard into the cabin and closed the door behind him, reasoning that if anyone passed this building they would assume the guard had gone to help with the fire and the prisoners were still safely tied up inside.
She heard chains fall behind her and then their entire group was moving in unison.
Without saying a word, they followed Daryl's silent footsteps away from the cabin.
He stopped abruptly when they got to a certain point along the large wooden wall. Michonne saw that there were small grooves that had been hacked out of tree trunks that made up the wall. "We're supposed to climb it?" she whispered to Daryl in the dark.
The light from the fire was completely hidden by the large house in the center of the compound.
"Only way out," he nodded. Michonne realized then that he didn't have any weapons outside of the small knife he had given to Glenn to cut their ropes.
"What about the other side?" Glenn asked, seeing the grooves in the wood.
"Don't break your ankle when you fall because I ain't givin' out any piggybacks," Daryl shrugged.
"What about walkers? Or what if they follow us. Going to take everything down with that one knife?"
"Still working on that," Daryl replied cryptically as his eyes searched the darkness.
"Sounds like the shittiest plan I've ever heard," Abraham scoffed.
"Just take the knife and start climbing, don't know how long we've got," Daryl commanded.
Glenn sighed loudly and tentatively began scaling the fence first.
/
Once Glenn, Michonne and Abe were all over the wall, and Beth still wasn't here, Daryl began to worry.
"Where is she?" Morgan asked him, staring in the same direction as Daryl.
"Went to get the weapons after we started the fire." Daryl's brow furrowed, "She should be here by now. Something must have gone wrong."
There was a quiet whistle from the other side of the wall and Morgan smiled brightly. He put his hands in the holes in the wall and began climbing.
"What the hell? You're not gonna wait for her?" He had to work to keep from shouting and being discovered.
"She's already over there," Morgan grinned down at him before disappearing over the top of the wall.
Daryl started climbing. From the top, he could see that the fire they had started was still ablaze but that the people of the Hilltop were feverishly working to keep it from spreading.
He suddenly felt eyes on him and he glanced around.
Jesus was 10 houses down but he was staring directly at Daryl.
It was a dark night but Daryl had no doubt that the fire would have lit him up easily for Jesus to see clearly. He expected Jesus to run for him, or to start shouting for backup, or to do anything to prevent him from escaping. But instead Jesus just nodded before picking up two fire extinguishers and heading towards the fire.
Daryl wasn't going to wait around to figure out what the hell Jesus was doing. So he dropped along the wall and joined his group. Beth handed him his crossbow and he checked that the others were armed as well.
Beth and Daryl ran in front, leading them back towards the van they'd left behind days ago. Michonne and Abe brought up the rear. They stopped occasionally in their running, usually whenever Daryl started coughing or Abe began slowing.
When the van came into sight about a half mile up the road, the group slowed to a walk with relief but Beth started sprinting.
Daryl didn't bother to keep pace with her.
He was exhausted, muscles and lungs burning painfully. But mostly, he was still pissed at her changing the plan.
She was supposed to meet them at the fence. Daryl had waited for her and that caused Jesus to spot him. Even though Jesus hadn't sounded the alarm right away, the Hilltop community could be sending people after them right now.
Up ahead, he heard a cry and saw the flash of Beth's blonde hair fall to the ground.
The whole group began running in unison again.
When they got to the van, they saw her being attacked.
By Lucky.
The big dog had knocked her to the ground and was covering her with kisses while his tail wagged happily. Beth was laughing and petting the furry dog. Lucky then went for Morgan, stretching on its hind legs to lick the older man's face. Morgan's bright white teeth shone in the dark and he murmured things like "Good boy," to the dog. He padded over to Daryl next and rubbed against his legs waiting for pets.
The entire group piled into the van and Daryl noticed the remains of several small birds lying under the car before hopping in the drivers seat.
The next day, after sleeping for a full twelve hours, eating enough food for two people, and filling in Rick on everything that had happened, Daryl was chopping firewood.
He really wanted a cigarette but after making the group stop at least a dozen times yesterday because of his coughing, he figured he should find a healthier habit.
Winter was coming so they needed firewood. Winters were brutal up here in Alexandria unlike anything he'd ever experienced in Georgia. And hitting things with an axe was helping him take out his anger.
That is until Beth came sauntering over, with Lucky on her heels and began helping him. She pulled the split logs from the block and tossed them in the wheelbarrow before placing another thick log upright for him.
Daryl hacked away furiously; getting angrier the longer she stood there acting all helpful.
"You wanna talk to me or just keep pretending you're Paul Bunyan?" She finally said, holding the next log in her hand instead of putting it down for him to chop.
"Not sure if it's a conversation you want to be havin' while I've got an axe in my hand." Daryl impatiently ripped the wood from her hands and began hacking away at it.
"Maybe you're right. You might hurt me or something," she scoffed.
Daryl looked up, irritated and ready to shout at how stupid she was being. But then he saw that her palms were bloodied.
"Shit, Beth," he dropped the axe to the ground and reached for her hands. She pulled away from him. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to… I didn't mean to scare you. Just let me look at how bad it is."
"Didn't scare me," Beth seemed thoroughly confused by the suggestion that Daryl hurting her while holding an axe could have scared her. But Daryl pushed this concern out of his head when she turned her palms to him and she said, "It's just a scratch."
There were a few jagged scrapes, but they were deep enough to bleed and had been caused by Daryl pulling the bark roughly out of her hands.
"Now that you injured me, does that earn enough sympathy points to get you to tell me what's wrong?"
He let out a long, exasperated breath. Guilt gnawed painfully inside his stomach, he had never meant to hurt her. "Just stick to the damn plan next time. Waiting for you for so long got us caught and I... we had no idea if you were in trouble."
Beth nodded as she wiped the blood from her hands off on her pants. "I'm… I'm sorry," she sputtered over the apology, still confused and defiant. Daryl almost laughed. It was so different from the meek, apologetic girl he used to know. It reminded him of the girl who yelled at him outside the moonshine shack. "Morgan and I have worked together for so long that he knows what I am gonna do before I do it. I never have to explain myself because he just… trusts me."
Her blue eyes were shinning in the afternoon light and he paled under her glare as she continued, "If you can't trust me… then I don't think we can keep working together. I'm sorry I changed the plan, but you should know that I did it for a good reason."
Daryl's mind went blank in a panic when she suggested that they shouldn't work together anymore. But he watched as she pulled several folded papers out of her back pocket and handed them to him.
Maps and hand written notes about the group called the Raiders that had been following the Alexandrians and the Hilltop people.
"It's everything the Hilltop knows about the Raiders. Figured it might be useful information." Beth had a cocky grin stretched across her face while she stared at his shocked expression.
"I guess I can learn to trust ya," he said with a shrug, trying to act nonchalant as her increasing smile distracted him.
Her smile was the same, but her eyes were different than he remembered… darker… as if they had siphoned off the shadows of the outside world.
Being with Beth made him feel like he was getting whiplash—some moments she was the same and other times she was so different that it made his head spin. She had become the best of both worlds somehow; still innocent enough to smile and yet dark enough that she seemed fearless.
Shaking off thoughts of her, he moved away from the now exceptionally large woodpile and said, "Let's get this shit to Rick."
/
Three days later, Beth was really happy that Daryl had spent several hours with the axe the other day. It was snowing now, even though Eugene's calendar said it was only November.
Maggie, Tara and Beth were gutting and skinning the animals Daryl had caught in the forest the day before. It was probably the last time he'd be able to go hunting for a while since the snow meant animals would be going into hibernation or at least would be less likely to be running around outside now. Carl and Enid were playing with Judith in the living room and occasionally big laughs would erupt from the room. Beth still was not accustomed to the wholesome family experience of games and laughter, so she was happy to have something normal to do like skinning squirrels.
Tara had still been upset about her friend Rosita's death, so Maggie had insisted that Tara get out of her room and come cook dinner with them. It was nice to have someone else in the kitchen. Maggie recruited Beth to help with dinners almost every night that Beth was in Alexandria.
And it was exhausting.
Maggie was always watching Beth out of the corner of her eye. Or would subtly mention things from their old life and then stared intently, as if she was waiting for Beth to react or suddenly announce that she had remembered everything.
Beth never remembered anything, of course.
Trying to grasp her memories was like trying to carry water with open fingers.
And it was tiring to see Maggie's perpetually disappointed face
So it was nice to have Tara to distract Maggie. Plus, Tara had apparently never met Beth before her accident so there was no pressure to remember or disappointment on Tara's face whenever she did something that "old Beth" never would have done. Tara just accepted Beth completely as she was now.
Tara was telling a story about her first day in the police academy, " I was the only female in the entire class so I thought it would be no problem to just walk from the shower to my locker naked but then I hear voices. It turns out that the locker room was co-ed, so all the guys come stomping in! So that was how I got stuck with the nickname 'Full Moon' for the rest of the year."
Two hours later after were finishing dinner, the entire Grimes family—she called all of them the Grimes family even though she knew almost none of them were related—was rowdy and excited. The snow caused hardships of course, like food and supply scarcities, but it also meant that the walkers were slower and that any people would have a harder time stalking them.
They apparently had another tradition that was very peculiar to Beth.
Movie night.
Beth was told Deanna had started this tradition at the very beginning of Alexandria. She wanted people to feel a sense of "normalcy" as she described it, so once a month families were encouraged to pick a DVD from the library and watch it as a family. She even saved bags of popcorn so each household would have one bag for every movie night.
She had been able to avoid last month's movie night by climbing up to the roof of Aaron and Eric's house last month, and they were too nice to impose on her personal space so the men had actually come and watched a movie at Rick's house last month.
Tonight, the Grimes family was getting settled on the floor and couches and chairs while Carol popped popcorn in the microwave.
She sat in the kitchen, on the granite countertop and was waiting for the ideal moment to sneak out. Maggie had picked some animated movie about two robots falling in love and the whole thing just made Beth want to gag.
"You should stay," Carol whispered from across the kitchen.
"Can't." She grumbled.
"Can't… or won't?" Carol challenged.
She glared, knowing that Carol had hit the nail on the head. She had no interest in snuggling up with the family and watching a stupid movie.
"I know this must be strange for you… I can't even imagine how strange. But it won't get any easier if you keep resisting," Carol reasoned, still keeping her voice low enough that the others couldn't hear it over all their chatter.
"Movies are dangerous," she started explaining but Carol just gave her a confused look. "Letting your guard down, watching movies, getting accustomed to showers and baking casseroles… It makes people weak and it will only be that much harder when we inevitably end up back on the road outside of these walls."
"That's what I used to think too," Carol admitted with a chuckle.
Beth seriously considered pushing off of the counter and ditching right now, but curiosity got the best of her. "What changed your mind?"
"Got tired of murdering people in cold blood. Decided it was better to go with the flow and live a happy life instead of constantly killing everyone I meet just for one extra, miserable day."
The brutal honesty of Carol's answer caught Beth off guard and she almost laughed.
"Out there, we were just surviving... In here, we live." Carol smiled stoically and her eyes had a far off look in them. "We're all going to die eventually. But I guess I decided I wanted to live a little first instead of spending every moment running and killing."
The microwave beeped and Carol moved to get the popcorn.
"There's a bunch of extra blankets in Daryl's old room upstairs if you want to grab one and join us," Carol said. Without waiting for a response from Beth, she left the kitchen and joined the group on the couch.
Beth contemplated for another few minutes, staring at the family from behind. Morgan was sitting in a large, plush chair. Glenn had his arm on the couch wrapped around Maggie's shoulder. Tara, Eugene and even Abraham were stretched out on blankets along the hardwood floor. Michonne was sitting on the floor in between Rick's legs. Judith was lying across Daryl's lap, curling a lock of her hair. Even Lucky had joined the mess and she watched as Sasha snuck the dog a few popcorn kernels. They all looked so content and… relaxed.
Suddenly, Beth wanted to know what it felt like to be relaxed… even for just one minute. She wanted to turn off her brain, to stop constantly surveying her surroundings, to do anything that didn't involve cleaning weapons or surveillance or finding food.
So she slid off the counter and went to the bedroom to grab another blanket.
However, when she opened the closet Carol described, something else grabbed her full attention.
Blankets entirely forgotten, she stared at the black leather jacket hanging on the back of the door. It was so thoroughly worn that the leather was softer than anything she'd ever felt. There was evidence of where the vest had been ripped and then carefully sewn together again. The golden wings embroidered on the back were the first things she could ever remember that felt truly familiar to her in this world.
She'd had dreams of following an angel through a forest since she woke up years ago.
But it hadn't been an angel.
And they hadn't been dreams.
It had been Daryl.
/
A/N: *Runs and hides * Sorry for the cliffhanger. (But yay! Lucky is back! I know people were concerned about him, but he was just waiting like a good boy for Beth to return).
Follow to find out how Beth reacts! Will she hit him? Will she run off? Will she get the rest of her memories back? Will she remember that she was in love with him? It hasn't been written yet so reviews might sway me in one direction or another ;)
PLEASE, PLEASE review! (Totally not begging or anything.) I would love to know if people still have any interest in this story or if I should just give it up. Each and every review (good and bad) is so motivating!
Also, if you are a Supernatual fan, or a fan of my writing, please check out my other story (TWD and SPN crossover) called "My Beloved Monster." I am really excited about that story and where it is headed so check it out!