Chapter 90-The tides of war

Daryl's P.O.V

Daryl stood behind a tree as bullets flew past him, clutching his bleeding arm. Everything had been okay, and then all of a sudden, bullets started to fly at them from the woods. He didn't know where anybody was or who was alive, hearing screams, yells, and shots in all directions Daryl grabs his radio off his hip, just saying "Help."

"Daryl?" John says.

"We got ambushed! We're about halfway to the hospital," Daryl says, leaning out and shooting several bullets.

"What do you want us to do?"

"Stay where you are. We're going to bring them back," Daryl says. "Be ready," Moving away from the tree and stopping behind another tree, he then stops when he sees Alicia sitting against the tree, holding her stomach, causing his heart to freeze. Daryl runs over to her and grabs her. "Hey, hey," Daryl says as he moves her hand and sees her stomach bleeding.

"Daryl, you have to go," Alicia muttered

"I ain't going anywhere. You're going to be okay, you understand?" Daryl says frantically at his wife's tone and the wound. Hearing footsteps, he turned and stopped to see it was Maggie.

"Get her out of here. Get her somewhere safe. If you don't, she will die, Daryl," Maggie says as she pulls a bandage out of her back and presses it against her stomach.

She moves Alicia's back off the tree, causing her to groan. "There's an exit wound," Maggie says as she pulls her belt off and ties it around Alicia's wound. "Go, now. We'll be okay."

"But what about-" Daryl looked at her, worry in his eyes.

"GO!" Maggie peeked over and started giving them covering fire.

Daryl grimaced but nods as he helps Alicia up and moves further into the woods, praying that his family would be alright.

Negan's P.O.V

Ducking behind a tree, he leaned out and shot a man in the throat as he cursed, trying to figure out where to go. He heard a shout, turning to see one of these assholes pointing a gun at someone on the ground. Not thinking, he ran through the trees and tackled him, Negan punched the man multiple times before grabbing his knife from his belt and stabbing him in the neck, Negan looks at who the Richmond soldier was trying to kill, only to pause bewildered. "Gabe?" Negan asks, stumped, as he looks at the boy, recognizing him as David's son and Javier's nephew, looking shaken and pale. He grabs his arm and moves him behind a tree, growling down "What the hell are you doing out here?"

"They killed my sister, I wanted to fight!" Gabe growls, trying to struggle to do something, anything.

"They almost killed you!" Negan shouts. "We have to go. We have to get back to Alexandria,"

"What about the others?" Gabe asks.

"If they are smart, they'll run for Alexandria. Let's go," Negan says as he starts to run, and Gabe follows.

Badger's P.O.V

After ten minutes, the gunfire had stopped, and bodies from both sides lay on the ground. Badger walked through them, looking at the faces. "Anybody, we're after?" A soldier asks.

"No, they must have run," Badger grunted, but he felt proud as finally something went right since this started then grinned. "Get our men together. We are moving to Alexandria in fifteen minutes."

"What about the bodies?" Ava asks.

"Leave them to turn," Badger says flatly. "They aren't our problem."

"Badger!" One of his men called over as they drag someone over to them. "We got one."

Badger saw two of them dragging a woman by the arms and throwing her down, One of them cocking his gun and pointing to the back of her head. Badger leaned down and grabbed her by the hair and smiles. "Is this one we are looking for?" A soldier asks.

"No, you're Maggie. You're dating the camera woman. I saw the tapes, you two. You were so cute together."

Maggie spits in his face, causing him to blink and he slapped her to the ground, scowling. "I'll kill you."

"No, you won't."

"Want me to pop her sir?" His man cocked his gun and pointed it down at her, causing the woman to pale but still stare at them defiantly.

Thinking it over he shook his head "Hmmm nah, let's take her back. Maybe we can use her for something. Besides our new partner might have an idea."

"Who?" Maggie asks.

"You're old friend, Cyndie." Badger says before Ava knocks Maggie out.

"What about Alexandria?" Ava asks.

"Take half of the troops here, no mercy. They'll be weak," Badger tells Ava, who nods as she starts to gather men.

Daryl's P.O.V

Daryl and Alicia slowly moved through the woods, half carrying her through as he looked around. But then suddenly, Daryl is taken to the ground as a man tackled him, growling "Oh there you are you little bitch, Badger'll be happy when I bring him your damn head!"

Alicia falls to the ground with a gasp as the man punches Daryl, The two struggling for a moment as the man reached for his pistol, but then just as suddenly as he appeared a bullet goes through his eye.

Gasping, Daryl pushes his body off as a woman comes out of the woods, staring at the sight and at the nearby Alicia, pale and clutching her stomach Daryl ignores her and goes over to Alicia. "Follow me." She asked, causing Daryl to look at her cautiously at the random good Samaritan. "I can help her," She offered as she helps Daryl get Alicia up.

Daryl nods as they move through the woods until they enter a cabin, taking Alicia into the back room and laying her on the bed. The woman goes to her closet, pulls out a bag, and sets it on the bed as she pulls supplies out of it. "How long ago was she shot?" She asks Daryl.

"Fifteen minutes ago." Daryl says as he rubs his hands on his face and Alicia's blood smears on his face. The woman nods as she turns Alicia on her side.

"Hold her." The woman tells Daryl, who grabs her as she works.

An hour later, Daryl sat down and laid his face in his hands as the woman put a bandage around Alicia's stomach and back. "Who is she?" She asks Daryl.

"My wife." Daryl says. "Mother of my kids. My partner."

"Well don't worry," She said gently. "It doesn't look like anything major was hit, and most of the bleeding had been stopped by the time you got here. You guys did good." She says as a puppy enters the room.

"You got a dog?" Daryl suddenly looked at it, stunned at seeing a panting actually puppy and not one of the savage feral types.

"I do," She says as she sits down, saying kindly offering her hand. "I'm Leah."

Shaking it in gratitude, he responded. "Daryl, that's Alicia. Will she live?"

"I think so. She will need time to heal. Who were they?" Leah asks, clearly curiously if any of them would come here.

"A group who killed my friends, trying to kill my family..." He then looked at her in gratitude "Thank you."

Waving this off, Leah offered. "I'm going to get you something to eat and water to clean your face. I'll be back."

Daryl nods as she leaves the room, the dog happily following her. Daryl walks over to the bed and sits down as he sighed in worry again. He grabs Alicia's hand as tears start to go down his face. "I need you, fight Alicia. I can't do this without you."

John's P.O.V

John raised his gun as people came out of the woods. He lowered it when he saw it was Shane, Madison, Beth, Tara, and Alden. John and Carl move out of the bushes, holstering their guns. "What the hell happened?" Carl asks.

"They ambushed us,. I don't know where everybody else is, don't even fucking know if their alive or dead," Shane says as Negan exits the woods with Laura, Troy, Clementine, and Gabe, dragging Gabe by the arm in particular with gritted teeth.

"Gabe?" Javier says as he comes out with David, running up to the boy with worry on their faces after he vanished an hour ago.

"Your kid joined us," Negan says, throwing him to Javier with a stumble, Kate approaches him and looks at him. "Had to save him from some of those dumbasses,"

"Thank you," Kate says to Negan, who just grinned at her but looked away as Enid asked.

"Daryl? Alicia? Maggie?" With worry at the last name.

"I don't know," Negan says, looking back at the woods. "I couldn't see shit in there. They knew we were coming or at least knew we were here. I think this is everyone. They took down most of us at the start."

"They are going to follow. We stay where we are and wait," John orders.

"What?!" Negan looked over, wide eyed. "Wait!? Their still out there for all we know!"

Shane nodded, his surrogate daughter was out there and the mother of his grandchildren "I'm agreeing with him, Daryl, Alicia and Maggie are still out there, we need to go get them."

John said sternly "We will, After we deal with Badger and his men, right now we stick to the plan."

Negan waved his arm around, squaring up to John "The plan fucking changed cowboy, we need to tuck in our big boy pants and get them before those fuckers do hell knows what with them!"

"Negan-" Laura tried to step in to calm him down.

Shane added, his face red "We need to be out there-"

A gunshot ran through the air and Everyone stopped as Carl lowered his gun and holstered it "All of you calm down!" Carl looked at Negan and then Shane sternly "I get your worried, but those assholes could be here any minute. Going out there could get you killed and you might run into them again. We settle and we wait. If anyone can survive out there it's those three. We don't do Anything that can compromise that."

After a moment, Negan closed his eyes and let out a breath as Shane looked displeased still but Madison, her face worried for her daughter, rubbed his arm and led him away.

"Come on," Carl ordered, "Let's get things set up."

With that, they followed him and John, some more reluctant then others.

Maggie's P.O.V

Maggie woke up and looked around the room she was in. She recognized it and remembered what Badger told her, it was Cyndie's trailer. "It's good to see you again," Cyndie says as she walks inside, sitting across from her.

"Cyndie."

Smiling, Oceanside's leader said. "I'm sorry about all this, I didn't ask for you to be captured but...well what's done is done."

For a moment there was silence, as they looked at each other for the first time in years, then Maggie broke the silence

"What did you do?" As she asked, she tried to untie the ropes behind her, trying not to let it show.

"I worked with the enemy, just like Rick and Daryl did all those years ago."

Maggie kept her face calm hoping to reason with her former partner. "Cyndie, just let me go, we can walk away from this. You don't have to do this, we were friends once."

"That was before you and the rest of those assholes started to work for those extortionists and lunatics." Cyndie's face went cold then something popped into her head, tilting her head at Maggie curiously "Did you ever kill him?"

"No, I didn't." Maggie answered. "He burned that bat. He keeps his distance and I keep mine."

Hearing this, Cyndie looked at her surprised then scoffed "Tch, you know, I thought you were smarter than that, Maggie. You knew back then that all the Saviors needed to die. Or at the least have them live in fear. Like we lived in fear."

"I was wrong, and Rick almost died because of it. I will never make that mistake again." Maggie said softly, eyes haunted as there were still some nights she heard the bridge exploding, Judith and Andrea being left without a father in part for her need for blood.

"Rick and Daryl will be dead soon enough, and so will Carl, Alicia, Arat, and Rachel," Cyndie says, getting her attention back.

"What?" At some of those names, Maggie looked horrified "Rachel? She was your friend! And Carl and Alicia didn't do anything to you!"

"WAS my friend, then she double crossed us joining them!" She snapped, then asked icily "And you know, Rachel told me something a while ago...there was a little secret between Carl and Negan. He's the one who wanted to spare him in the first place didn't he?"

Staring defiantly, Maggie kept silent and changed the subject "What did you tell them? Cyndie what the fuck did you do!?"

"I just told them where the communities were."

"You what? You're going to get kids killed! My Son!" Maggie roared at her, leaning as far as she could in her chair.

"Don't worry. I didn't tell them about the Camp. I figured that is where you guys would hide the children, and since Daryl and Rick are most likely on the front lines, they have no reason to know."

Maggie stayed silent and kept her calm facial expression as she realized that Cyndie didn't know about Rick's injuries, and if they were still looking for Rick they would stumble on the Camp soon enough and in turn the Children he was guarding.

Judith, Andrea, Ofelia, Gracie, AJ...

Arya...

Hershel.

"You aren't any better than the Saviors." She angrily accused her, her rage coming to the surface.

"What? What? How fucking dare you?! I am! After what they did to me!? To my people!? TO US?! Why are you still protecting them!? The fucking monsters who laughed while your husband was beaten to death in front of you, leaving your child without his damn father!?" Cyndie shouts back.

"Because I know that they aren't the enemy anymore," Maggie says calmly almost with pity. "I learned that revenge doesn't help. It only gets people hurt. Do you think killing any of them will take away your grief? All the pain? Make you feel better? It won't."

Cyndie pulls out her gun and aims it at Maggie, clearly out of patience. "You're a hypocrite, Maggie! All of you are!" But then, Maggie got her hands out of the ropes and hits the gun out of Cyndie's hand. She tackles Cyndie into her chair, the two falling over with a grunt as Cyndie grabs Maggie and headbutts her.

Maggie falls backward as Cyndie stands and moves for her gun, but was stopped as Maggie grabs Cyndie by her hair and slams Cyndie's head into the floor. She slams her face down three more times and lets her go. Looking around frantically, she ran for the knife on the dresser and grabbed it just as Cyndie started to turn, catching it in the side...Maggie screamed in anger and anguish...

Coughing out blood, Cyndie just said "You...won't...win...their on their way...right now."

"We'll win. We'll stick together as we've done since the start," Maggie says as she grabs the knife again and stabs the knife into Cyndie's chest until blood covers Maggie's face and the ground around her, screaming each time she did so. Maggie stood up and stared at Cyndie's dead body, panting in and out, eyes full of mixed emotions...anger, pity, sadness, relief as she moved to the back of the trailer and opened the window, to the night air.

Looking at the trailer one last time, her face in blood...seeing the true cost of revenge first hand...she sighed and moved forward, more then anything to get back to her family and to her son.

John's P.O.V

The group watched as Ava's group slowly entered Alexandria. "That's Ava." David says as he tries to move forward. Negan grabs him and covers his mouth as they enter Alexandria.

Walking forward cautiously, the large group of fighters saw the empty streets and houses, looking around, some lowering guns in confusion...some voices calling out that they abandoned this place too.

John and Carl run to the gate as the first gunshot goes off inside of Alexandria, shutting the door and putting a lock on it as they started to hit the fence.

"Spread out!" John says into his radio. "They'll start to go over the wall soon," John says as he pulls his revolver out and backs up as more gunshots go off inside of Alexandria. John shoots a man through the head as he tries to climb over the wall. Gunshots started to echo around Alexandria as the group tried to escape the walker-infested Alexandria, all of them coming out of the shadows of the night and from the houses, howling and awoken by the gunfire, heading to the large group in the middle, who were screaming in panic, realizing they had been set up.

They heard screaming from inside as the walkers took some of the soldiers down and toured them apart. The gunfire stopped after a couple of minutes, and so did the screaming. Bodies lay on both sides of the walls as John put his gun in his holster and looked around.

"This has been a bad night for both sides." Negan says as he looks around. "What's next?"

"We find our people, send people out for them. NOW!" John ordered, his voice echoing throughout Alexandria..

Thanks for reading. Cyndie is dead. Her betrayals have come back to haunt her. Alicia is now injured and fighting for her life. Daryl has met Leah and Dog, and John now has to lead the forces as Maggie makes her way back towards Alexandria, and the group deals with the walkers in Alexandria. As always, suggestions, ideas, and feedback are welcomed. Until next time.