Beauty and Her Beast (Daryl Dixon Fanfic)

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Dwight was on his knees, but he was staring at Daryl, who was breathing heavily beside me. "Look at me." Rick spoke. He looked back at Rick. "Why?"

" 'Cause I want it stopped. I want Negan dead." He answered.

"So why don't you kill him?"

"Can't just be me." He shook his head. "They're all Negan."

Tara walked up, bending over. "That girl you murdered...she had a name. Her name was Denise and she was a doctor. And she helped people." She gritted through her teeth.

Dwight looked down for a moment. "I wasn't aiming for her."

Daryl lunges forward at that, pushing him against the wall by his throat and holding his knife mere inches from his face. His whole body shaking with rage. "Do it. Do it." Tara egged him on. I wouldn't object, this man turned my husband into a different person. He'll never be the same.

"You wanna end it this way...you go ahead. I'm sorry. I am. I know you want to."

"He could just be here to see if you were here." Rick suggested.

"We can't trust him." Michonne added.

"He owned me. But not anymore. What I did, I was doing it for someone else. She just got away. So now I'm here. So are you because of her."

"Do it." Tara was getting angrier by the second.

"There's another choice."

"Daryl. Daryl, you knew her."

"Negan trusts me." Daryl started moving his knife closer to his eye. "We can work together, we can stop him." Daryl stopped moving his knife. "You know me then, and you know me now. You know I'm not lying. I'm not."

"Do it. Do it!"

Daryl started breathing heavily again, but lowered his knife. He still held him by his throat. "They have Sasha, if she's even alive." Rosita told us. I furrowed my brow.

"Why didn't you say something?" Jesus asked. "He could be our only chance to get her back."

"Because I don't trust him." She answered. "But I trust Daryl."

"Negan's coming soon." Rick faces him again. "Tomorrow. Three trucks probably. 20 Saviors and him. I can slow them down, bring some trees down in the road, buy a little time for you guys to get ready. If you can take them out, that's where we start. You kill them, I'll radio back to the Sanctuary."

"The Sanctuary?" Rick asked quickly.

"Where Negan lives. That's what they call it. I can radio back to them and say everything's okay. You drive the trucks back, and I can lead you right inside, and, with the right plan, we can wipe out the rest. Check to see if your friend's still alive. Then we get the workers on our side, build our numbers up, and go from outpost to outpost and end this."

"Keep talking."

~*~

Rick and I sent our kids with Jesus. Luke wanted to stay and fight, so I had to tell him that he couldn't, not with his leg. He was mad, but he left. The scavengers arrived on bikes and dump trucks. We set up a bomb in a harmless looking delivery truck with basically all of the explosives we got off the road. Michonne was in the tower with a scavenger, our eyes in the sky.

The scavengers used bird calls to let everyone know we were ready. "Rosita." Rick calls from the platform." "Get into position. I'll signal you." He looked at the truck. "And the walls gonna hold?"

"It'll hold."

I squeezed Daryl's arm, kissing him. "Don't die. I love you."

He nodded. "Didn't plan on it."