[Finished] Living Among the Dead

53. The Bridge

"I don't like them out here," Daryl says, yet again. We're at the campsite doing our best to help oversee the building of the bridge.
"And I'm not willing to leave them home alone," I put my hand up as he starts to talk. "I know they'd have Maggie, but I want them with us."
"You could stay home," he responds.
I raise an eyebrow at him, shaking my head.
"Alright, well I'm going to go start working, I'll see you when I get back."
I nod, kissing his cheek; "Be safe."
He nods once, before turning to the girls and picking them both up at once, giving them each a kiss on their cheeks, and then putting them down, although Gracie jumps on his back as he picks up our now year old son, Paul. He tickles his stomach before putting him down as well.
Letting them both down he walks out of the tent.

I start walking to the bridge to bring Daryl and Aaron food and to let Aaron out so he can go watch the girls and Paul and I hear Aaron talking about the girls, "So, I go in after their nap and pick Gracie up, and the diaper just explodes all over me."
"Sounds like good times," Daryl grunts.
"Oh, the best. Well, you know."
"What?" Daryl asks.
After a moments silence, Aaron responds, "You're a great dad."
"Yeah," Daryl grunts back, and it's obvious he doesn't believe the words.
"Yes he is," I say, and they both look up at me, Aaron standing up and walking over to me, grabbing the bit of snake I'd caught and cooked for their lunch.
"Thanks," he says, and starts walking down to relieve Enid of the kids.
"You are a great father," I tell him, as I offer him his snake.
"I'm not around," he responds.
"Your making the future-"
I stop as I hear a bang, when I look I see Henry getting off the ground and as I rush forward to punch the guy who's now drinking the water from Henry's container, Henry knocks him off his feet with his stick and grabs the container and starts walking off.
Another of the Saviors laughs and says, "Hey, man, it's cool. I got my ass handed to me by a kid one time, too. Of course, I was 6 at the time." He helps the first savior up.
The man glares at his buddy then starts walking towards Henry, and Daryl rushes past me and pulls the guy back saying, "Hey. Kid's just doing his job. Get back to work."
The long haired Savior responds with, "I don't need your people telling me what to do. You're not my babysitter anymore." He goes to walk off, but Daryl pulls him back by his arm, and the guy throws a punch, he misses but Daryl's lands, knocking the guy back on his ass, but the man then throws sand into Daryl's eyes.
That's when I rush forward, punching the man square in the jaw, I duck his returning punch and kick his leg out from under him and landing another punch to his face, he gets up quickly and punches me square in the eye, and Daryl grabs him pushing him into a support log, punching him in the face, I'm now fighting his buddy who made the comment about getting beat up by a six year old as Rick comes running up to us, yelling, "Hey! Hey! Break it up! Break it up right now!" I see Rick getting between Daryl and long haired dickhead and then Eugene gets between the asshole fighting me as I keep trying to throw punches at the douche.
"Hey! I said enough! I said enough. Enough." Rick's yelling as I throw another punch at the man after side stepping Eugene.
I feel Daryl's hand catch my arm as I go to throw another punch; and when I turn to see it's him, I huff and walk off.

"So, that asshole just gets a free pass? Is that it?" Daryl demands as we talk in Rick's tent.
"It's just a few more days. I don't like it, either, but we're in a rush to get that work done. He's strong. The Saviors are over half the workforce, and we've had too many walk off already."
"Yeah. 'Cause that's who they are. Some of them ain't ever gonna fall in line just 'cause you say so."
"Daryl's right," Carol agrees. "These people have never had to live together. And we can't expect them to just forget what's happened."
"It hasn't been easy," Rick allows, "I know. It won't be, not for a while, but it's not about forgetting. It's about moving ahead, all of us, together. We keep doing that, they'll see we're all on the same side."
"Are we, though?" Daryl asks. "Are we on the same side, Rick?"
"Well, you tell me."
"Thing is, man, I've been tryin' to. But you don't seem to want to hear it." As Daryl walks out, I follow him.
"It's not been as easy as you've been letting on, has it?"
"No." He responds, shortly.
"I wasn't the one saying we shouldn't kick that asshole out, I'm on your side. Don't treat me like I'm siding with Rick. I'm always on your side, Daryl. I always will be."
"Let's just get back to our kids."

"You and the kids should go back to Hilltop, Jesus'll help."
I sigh, my leg bouncing as I watch our kids playing together. "I want to help out, here... and I don't feel comfortable taking our kids from Aaron... he's close to them."
"Jesus probably misses them."
I nod, "Probably, but he knows where to find us."
"I can't talk you into leavin' can I?"
"Nope, your stuck with us."
"They're gettin' out o' control."
I nod, standing up and approaching Daryl, letting my hands brush over his chest to his shoulders as I look at him in the eyes, "We will figure it out. With or without Rick, we'll figure it out."

"Who has the kids?" Aaron asks as I approach the work site.
"They're with Enid, she's taken over the infirmary, but she offered to take them. Carol said she'd relieve them after a bit."
I jump in to help Aaron and a few of the saviors pull up a log as the mules start freaking, when I glance over, Daryl's killing a walker.
"A herd's comin'! Bug out now!" Daryl calls.
"Oh, Jesus," one of the men holding up the log with a rope yells, "We gotta get the hell outta here." I watch in horror as he drops the rope and jumps.
I feel arms pushing me and hear Aaron say,"Look out." I then watch as if in slow motion as Aaron is crushed by the log.
I hurry to start trying to lift the log off of him, but it's heavy as shit, "Daryl!" I yell.
When he looks, he points to one of the men, "Get them mules out of here!" He points to another man, "You get over here right now!"
We all start trying to lift the log, and then as the Walkers start closing in, Aaron demands, "Go! Get out of here! Go!"
"No," I reply harshly.
"Keep on him," Daryl responds, moving to kill a few of the walkers before jumping in to help us finally move the log off of him.
"Daryl his arm..." I whisper, looking at the bloodied tissue.
"Aw, shit!"
"Oh god..." Aaron mumbles.
"Come on. Get up." Daryl says, gesturing to me to take Aaron's other side to help support him. "Get up! Get up!" We get him to a standing position and start walking, "Come on."
As one of the walkers approach us, it's hit with an arrow.
Reinforcements start running in, Rick passes us and says,"We've got this. Get him back to camp."
"On it," Daryl responds as we trudge through.
We make it to the infirmary tent and Daryl asks, "Where's Siddiq?"
"He's gone. It's just me." Enid responds.
"It's just you, then." Daryl grins laying Aaron down.
Enid looks at the arm and gasps out, "Anne, take your kids, I have to amputate."
"What?" I hear Aaron ask.
"There ain't no other way?" Daryl also asks.
"The only way to stop the bleeding is to amputate and cauterize the wound."
What?" Aaron repeats.
I pick up Paul and Hope and turn to Gracie, "Grab on to my pants leg, lets go."
"Uncle Rin." She gasps.
"C'mon, lets go." I instruct, walking outside and making sure their all looking forward as we all walk out, Aaron's screams following us.

We're outside sitting down when Daryl rushes past us, a few minutes later he comes out punching the long haired asshat. The man doesn't even have a chance to punch back.
"Daryl stop!" Carol says, rushing after them. "Daryl! Daryl."
Carol rushes over and puts a hand on him just as Hope screams, "Daddy!"
Daryl stops then and Carol looks at him, "I said stop. We'll deal with him, but not like this."
"There's only way to deal with these assholes." Daryl snaps before storming away.

"I just put the kids down," I tell Daryl, as he sits on our sleeping bag.
"She's scared o' me." He grunts.
"She'll get over it, your her dad."
"The only time she's called me dad is when she's crying in fear."
"She knows-"
He stands up, "'m gonna go check on Aaron." He then leaves the tent without even a goodbye. And it feels too much like the old us. Only this time, it's him who's running...

[A.N] Episode 2 of Season 9, I've decided to continue on with this story through Season 10; although I definitely wonder if their planning on giving Daryl a love interest this next season (I have yet to watch Season 10, so I'm not sure). But I fell back in love with writing this story, Season 10 might be the end of the story for us, but we never know, I might keep it up until the show is over? We'll see. Thank you to everyone who reads this, it means a lot to me that you do, and I'm hoping to get more interactions this season, even if it's through Tumblr. Lol