Daryl stepped out from underneath a bridge and looked around for any Saviors. There were none in sight. He raised his arm in the air, pointing to the woods across the road, and let out a quiet whistle. "C'mon," he said quietly to the Alexandrians he'd been traveling with throughout the night. "Best to stay off the roads. Head into the woods right there. C'mon. Go, go," he said, watching as the group passed by him. Every face walked by. Tara, Dwight, Siddiq, Tobin with Judith on his back, and Rosita. Rosita was the last, at the end. Daryl's eyebrows furrowed. He stopped Rosita. "Where's Rosie?" he asked.

"What? I thought she was with Tobin. She wanted to stick by Judith," Rosita said, her eyebrows furrowing now, too. Both Daryl and Rosita stopped and double-checked Tobin to see if Rosie really was there and Daryl just missed her. But no sign of her.

"God damnit," Daryl murmured, turning back to the woods they had just left from. Now he'd have to backtrack. "Can't take my eyes off that kid for one fuckin' second without her disappearin'." Rosie had been following along with them like she was supposed to all night long. Daryl had been periodically checking in on her to make sure she hadn't gotten her hands on a weapon that she could use to kill Siddiq- and, of course, checking in on her for her own well-being. And he had just taken her backpack to carry it for her not that long ago. She couldn't have gone far. Daryl started heading back to where they'd come from.

"Wait, wait. Where are you going?" Rosita said, stopping him.

"To go get 'er," Daryl said, assuming that that was already very obvious.

"You promised Rick you'd get Judith to Hilltop. These people need you," Rosita reminded him, gesturing to the large group of Alexandrians that were waiting on him.

"What, so I'm just s'posed to leave her?" Daryl asked with a scoff.

Rosita rolled her eyes. "That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying send someone else. Like Dwight," she suggested. Daryl scoffed and shook his head. Maybe he didn't want Tara to kill Dwight just yet, but that didn't mean that he had any trust in him. "Saviors won't kill him. If you go back there and get caught, you're dead. Dwight goes back, gets caught, he's fine," Rosita reasoned.

Daryl seemed to consider this for a moment, looking over at Judith. Couldn't Rosie have just done what she was supposed to this one time? What the hell could've gone through her head to make her leave the group without a word? Daryl wanted to throw his crossbow down and start yelling at everyone for not paying enough attention. But he didn't. He went over to Dwight and put his hand on his shoulder, forcibly turning him around to look at him. Daryl pulled his gun out of his waistband and put it in Dwight's hand. "You're goin' back," he said.

"What?" Dwight asked before Daryl could even finish what he was going to say.

"You're goin' back, lookin' for Rosie," Daryl told him.

"Rosie? She's with..." Dwight trailed off, looking over to Tobin only to see that Rosie wasn't anywhere near him.

"She's gone. You're goin' back to look for her. I see you again- I don't give a shit what happened- I see you again, and she's not with you, I'm puttin' a bullet in your head," Daryl said, his voice threatening and gravelly as he leaned in close. "Hear me?" Daryl asked.

Dwight nodded his head quickly. "Yeah. Yes. I'll find her," he said, swallowing. The last thing he wanted to do was backtrack, and maybe even run into the Saviors. But it wasn't like he could say no.

•

The group of Alexandrians had walked through the night. Rosie wasn't allowed to keep her knife in the sheath on her own belt anymore. Every time she looked at Siddiq she wanted to kill him. She'd been thinking a lot about Carl. As often as she'd been thinking about Carl, she'd been fidgeting with the bracelet he gave her, which was still tied around her wrist- at least, she thought it was. When the sun had just barely risen, Rosie had reached for the bracelet once more, only to find that it was gone. All her fidgeting must've somehow gotten it to untie and fall off. Rosie immediately started to panic, looking around in the grass below her feet for the beaded bracelet. It wasn't there. It wasn't there. She'd torn Fraser's hoodie and now she lost Carl's bracelet. Rosie felt so panicked and awful about losing Carl's bracelet that she didn't even think before going off to find it.

The only good thing about backtracking was that Rosie didn't have to kill any walkers. All of the walkers along her way had already been killed. Rosie felt very lucky for that, considering she didn't even have a weapon to use.

Only after already having been walking for a long while, Rosie began to realize the huge mistake she had made. She came to her senses and realized that she was out there all alone, no weapon, no map, no help, nothing. But there was no going back now, so Rosie just kept looking. It was hard to look for a bracelet when the ground was covered in leaves and branches, but Rosie made sure to look extra carefully. She needed to find this bracelet. She didn't know what she would do if she couldn't find it. Maybe it wouldn't actually be the end of the world, but it would certainly feel like it.

Rosie had been keeping her eyes glued to the ground beneath her feet, in order to find the bracelet. But keeping your eyes glued to the ground when walkers were roaming the woods wasn't exactly the smartest idea. A walker that Rosie hadn't even heard coming suddenly stepped out in front of her, grabbing onto her shoulders and pushing her to the ground. Rosie shrieked and started trying to push the thing off of her. Luckily for her, it wasn't a very big walker. It was bigger than her, certainly, but it wasn't too heavy.

As Rosie pushed the walker up by its shoulders, she managed to bend her knees up in order to start pushing on the walker's abdomen with her feet. She struggled with the walker for quite some time, unable to kill it without any weapons. After what felt like forever of wrestling with this walker, Rosie managed to shove the thing off of her using both her arms and legs. Once Rosie was free, she shot up to her feet and started running. She wasn't sure where she was running to, but she knew she had to get away from that walker, so she just ran.

Without even thinking about what might happen, Rosie ran out into a road, because there was a lot less to block her view of her surroundings out on the road compared to the forest. But as soon as she got out into the road and paused to take a breath, she heard a loud voice.

"Don't shoot! Don't shoot! That's a kid!" the loud voice shouted. It was Dwight's voice, Rosie was pretty sure. But whoever's voice it was didn't seem to matter to the person he was yelling at, because they pulled the trigger anyway. Suddenly, there was a sharp, agonizing pain in Rosie's right shoulder. In both pain and shock, Rosie looked back at them. It was Dwight and a few other Saviors, standing around in the road. Dwight was yelling, yelling, yelling at one of them, but the other two were just looking around, panicked and unsure of what to do. Panicked and unsure of what to do herself, Rosie just kept running.

During all this running, Rosie thought about Donnie. She thought about Donnie because Donnie was shot in the arm. Donnie was shot in the arm and Rosie thought he was a baby for how much he was complaining. But now she understood. She understood because god damn this hurt so bad. her left hand went up to her right shoulder, squeezing tight as if it would ease the firey pain, but it didn't. It only soaked her hand with blood.

Rosie ran until she couldn't anymore. She couldn't breathe, she couldn't think, she couldn't do anything. "It's ok, it's ok, it's ok," she kept whispering to herself. But now she didn't just feel not ok on the inside, she felt not ok everywhere.

Finding herself in some sort of downtown area with lots of abandoned shops and buildings, Rosie stumbled into one of them, closing the door behind her. It seemed to be some sort of decaying apartment or something like that. It had a few old tables and chairs, and, much to Rosie's luck, a few dirty mattresses. Rosie managed to get herself over to one of the mattresses and lay down on it before passing out, still squeezing tight on her shoulder. She didn't want to die yet.

•

The original reason for the Saviors' outing was to start heading to Hilltop. But when Dwight came back to the Sanctuary with a few other Saviors, anxiously gnawing on his thumbnail as he admitted to Negan that one of the Saviors had shot Rosie and they didn't know where she ran off to, plans changed. Once the Savior who had shot the little girl was dead, they all piled into their vehicles and made their way into the town that Dwight had said she was running towards.

Things were going to plan until they made it into the town. Negan's car was at the very back of the line of vehicles. At least, it was until another car slammed into it and hit it off of the road. And, of course, the person behind the attack was none other than Rick Grimes. Rick started firing shots at Negan, so he had no other choice but to run inside for cover.

Now the two of them were alone. Alone together in this dark, dark abandoned building. Neither of them had any idea of where the other was, but that didn't matter. Rick was determined to kill Negan, and Negan was determined to live. They couldn't both get what they wanted.

"You still alive?" Rick asked into the darkness, his only source of light being the dim lighter he held in his hand.

"I'm a goddamn cat," Negan replied, crawling around on the floor in search of his baseball bat, which he had dropped sometime during the fight. He let his hands slide over the debris of this decaying building, hoping and praying he'd feel the handle of his bat. A walker fell down behind him, and he jumped, still weaponless. As the walker made its way up to its feet, so did Negan. He hurried into a different room.

"So where's your people?" Rick asked, walking around in search of Negan. He was hoping he could follow the sound of his voice until he eventually found him. Then he put his axe right through Negan's head. "They should be here by now. We didn't get that far."

"Oh, they're coming," Negan taunted, unsure of his own words.

"This is where you die," Rick told him, his voice tense and angry. He made Negan a promise, and he very much intended on keeping it. "In the dark, all alone," Rick said.

"What the hell is your problem, Rick?" Negan shouted into the building. He was only trying to stall. He needed the Saviors to get here, so he could go find Rosie. She could be dead by now, for all he knew. "Huh? I mean, I know you're working through some shit- the worst kind of shit, I know- but if you aren't the most stubborn, know-it-all prick I've ever crossed dicks with..." Negan said, his voice echoing in the worn-down apartment building. "Why didn't you just let me save you, Rick?" he asked. "I'm good at it. I saved everybody at the Sanctuary, the Outpost, Hilltop, Kingdom- I saved 'em all. Their kids can grow up safe. They didn't lose one after we took over," Negan said. But maybe he'd lose one today, if this wasn't over with quickly. "All those people were doing just fine before Rick Grimes!"

Negan's little rant got no response from Rick. Negan kept wandering around the building, waiting for his people to show up. They would show up. They had to. He turned a corner and saw a long, thin object on the ground. He picked it up, praying it was Lucille. It wasn't. It was a metal rod, and he threw it to the ground.

"You not only failed your boy, you failed your people, Rick," Negan went on, trying to taunt Rick. He turned another corner, his eyes scanning the room. "Kind of makes me sick just thinking about it. All that wasted po..." he trailed off, his eyes widening a bit.

In the corner of the room, there was a pile of a few old mattresses. On top of one of them, he was pretty sure he could make out a person in the darkness. Quietly, he stepped closer to the person, part of him hoping that it was Rosie, so he wouldn't have to look for her anymore. But the other part of him prayed that it wasn't her, considering the large blood stain on the mattress. He was quiet- silent, even- until he got close enough to the person to see who it was. Sure enough, it was Rosie. The blood coming from her shoulder was starting to slow, but she had already lost a lot of blood- at least enough to make her pass out on this mattress.

"Oh, shit," Coach Smith muttered. Rosie was wearing two shirts still. One was the dark green, short-sleeved shirt that was hers, and the other was the long-sleeved, black button-down that belonged to Daryl. Coach Smith took off the black button-down and pulled the collar of the green shirt down a bit, checking for an exit wound. Luckily, there was one. He tore the sleeve off of the button-down, using it to wrap around Rosie's shoulder. The blood started to soak through the fabric almost immediately.

Rosie needed a doctor and she needed one badly. The last thing Negan wanted to do was let her go back to her people. He wanted to keep her with him. But the Saviors didn't have a doctor right now. Dr. Carson was gone. And the reason Negan had wanted her at the Sanctuary was to keep her safe, but it wasn't safe there anymore. And, even though it killed him to acknowledge it, the only person Rosie would want to see when she woke up was Daryl. She had said it herself. She was just scared of Negan now. So if Rosie was going to survive and be ok, it wasn't going to be with him.

"You givin' up?" Rick shouted in response to Negan's sudden silence.

Coach Smith picked up Rosie, carrying her unconscious body towards the direction he hoped Rick's voice was coming from. "Rick! We have bigger dogshit to worry about than your little vendetta against me!" he shouted.

Rick scoffed a little, shaking his head. "I already told you. This is where you die," Rick responded, not planning on falling for whatever bullshit Negan had in store.

"You want another kid to die today, Rick?" Negan asked, still trying to follow the sound of Rick's voice.

"What are you talking about?" Rick asked, his voice tense and skeptical, but also curious. He knew Rosie was missing. Daryl was out looking for her at that very moment. Rick was keeping an eye out for her himself. But did Negan know where she was?

"I'm being a man and putting our differences aside, Rick. Rosie's hurt. She needs a doctor. I don't have one," Coach Smith said.

Rosie started to stir in his arms, and for a moment, Negan worried that she was dead and turning. But when her eyes blinked open just the littlest bit, they began to widen upon seeing his face. Her breathing quickened. "Coach Smith?" she managed to mumble. She sucked in a sharp breath and her face scrunched up in pain. She tried turning to look at her shoulder, but before she could finish the movement, her eyes shut again and she was out cold once more.

"Rick! Where the hell are you?!" Coach Smith shouted, growing more and more impatient.

"How do I know you're not lying?" Rick asked, unsure of it all. What if it was a trap? What if Negan was really just waiting with Lucille, ready to bash Rick's head in?

"I'm not fucking lying! Where are you?!" Coach Smith shouted, looking back and forth between Rosie and where he was going. "I'm trying to save this kid!" he said. He didn't know what to do to get Rick to trust him, and if Rosie died right now, it would be his fault. Rosie was shot by one of his men, because she was running away from the home that he destroyed, and now she might die because Rick couldn't be sure if he was lying. "God damnit, Rick!"

"You're lying. You don't care about anyone. You use people to bring food... to sleep with you... to protect you. Now you're trying to use a little girl as bait. The only thing you care about is this bat," Rick said. Little did Negan know that Rick had Lucille, and he was dousing the bat in lighter fluid. "You can't even save that. I'll make you a deal. I'll let you kiss her goodbye."

"Don't you touch her!" Negan shouted, almost forgetting about the dying kid in his arms all because of some stupid baseball bat.

"Come and get her," Rick said, lighting the bat on fire. He started slamming on a door labeled EATERS!, breaking it down. Negan began following the sound of the banging rather than the sound of Rick's voice.

"Rick, I'm not fucking lying!" Coach Smith shouted, coming around the corner and watching as Rick sent one last hit to the door before it went tumbling down to the ground.

When Rick turned around and saw Rosie in Negan's arms, his eyes widened. "Shit," he murmured. Walkers started exiting the room they'd been trapped in, and Rick started fighting them off, using the burning baseball bat as his only weapon.

"Get your hands off her," Negan said, eyeing the baseball bat in Rick's hands. A walker came up behind him and, only for the sake of Rosie, Rick hit it off with Lucille before tossing the bat across the room. Now that both of his hands were free, Rick grabbed Rosie, taking her out of Negan's arms. While Negan went off to find that goddamn baseball bat, Rick got Rosie the hell out of there, climbing out a broken window.

Once he was outside, he paused for a moment to look over the girl. She was bleeding a lot and her skin was all pale. Negan wasn't lying. He was trying to save her life. Maybe he did care about something other than that damn baseball bat. But that wouldn't matter for much longer if Rick didn't get Rosie back to the Hilltop in time.

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This chapter kicked my ass fr