Claimed

Athena

The world after the fall wasn't made for hope. It was carved out of loss, stitched together with desperation, and held in place by fear. Every breath felt borrowed, every sunrise a cruel reminder that survival didn't mean living - it meant existing. You learned to stop caring about people because loving someone meant giving the world a loaded gun with their name on the bullet.

Daryl Dixon changed that for me.

In the midst of the apocalypse, when the world was nothing but ash and echoes, I found my soulmate. Not the fairy tale kind, wrapped in ribbons and sunlight, but the kind carved out of scars, blood, and battles survived side by side. I fell so deeply in love with him it'd make Romeo and Juliet look like amateurs. Daryl made me feel invincible, like every broken part of me had found its missing piece in him. He made me stronger, yet somehow weaker, like his very presence was the gravity holding me together, and without him, I'd collapse.

I'd let myself believe it was me and him against the world, that as long as we had each other, nothing could hurt us. But life had a way of laughing at that kind of hope.

Because now we weren't together.

And it felt like my soul had been ripped into pieces.

I'd lost him.

I'd lost everyone.

I couldn't find Merle again after we were separated at the funeral home. I didn't know if he was alive or dead.

Beth was gone, too. Kidnapped by god knows who.

I cursed myself for not staying in that car, for not letting them take me wherever they took her. Maybe if I'd gone with them, I could've found her, saved her. But in that moment, lying in the backseat half-drugged, I could only think about one thing:

They were taking me further away from the chance of ever finding Daryl again. If he was alive.

And I couldn't let that happen.

~

The Claimers weren't just another group of scavengers. They weren't like the desperate, starving people I'd crossed paths with before, people who'd kill for a can of beans or a bottle of water. No, the Claimers were something worse. A pack of wolves dressed in the tattered skin of humanity, their teeth sharper because they didn't pretend to be anything else.

They found me on the edge of the woods, not far from the funeral home where I'd last seen Merle. I'd gone back, hoping he'd still be there, but the house was empty.

I was injured - my shoulder definitely infected now, alone, heartbroken.

An easy target.

They surrounded me before I even heard them, moving through the trees like predators. I fought like hell. Smashed the butt of a man's own rifle into his face, feeling his nose crunch under the impact. Drove my knife deep into the thigh of another, hot blood spurting onto my hands.

But there were too many.

Rough hands grabbed me, pulling me down. The last thing I remembered was a heavy boot slamming into my ribs, a weight that felt like it split me in half, and the ground rushing up to meet me.

Then - darkness.

When I woke, I was tied to a splintered post in the middle of their camp. The sun was low, casting long shadows that felt like fingers reaching for me. My head throbbed, a dull ache blooming behind my eyes. Blood crusted in my hair, sticky and warm against my scalp. My wrists were raw from the ropes, skin chaffed and bleeding.

They'd set up camp in what used to be a truck stop, the rusting skeletons of old vehicles scattered like grave markers. The scent of rot mixed with motor oil, a nauseating blend of death and decay. Fires burned in metal barrels, casting flickering light on faces that looked more animal than human - filthy, hungry, soulless.

I knew why they hadn't killed me.

I knew what they wanted.

They thought I was weak, that being tied up and broken meant I was already theirs.

But they were wrong.

I'd die before I let these monsters use my body.

So I waited. I watched. I listened.

I counted how many of them there were, noted which ones carried knives instead of guns, which ones were slow, which ones were cocky enough to get sloppy.

~

After a couple of days tied up, my wrists raw and burning from the coarse ropes, they told me we were moving. The leader of the small group - a wiry man with a patchy beard and eyes like cold steel - grunted the news without ceremony, like I was nothing more than cargo. "Time to join the rest of the crew," he muttered, as another man pulled on my arm painfully.

My heart sank. More of these men would only make it harder to flee. I'd spent every waking moment, even through the fevered haze of my infected wound, mapping out routes in my mind, counting their shifts, watching how they handled their weapons. But I wasn't ready - not yet.

When we set out, they didn't bother to keep me bound. Maybe they thought the antibiotics they'd begrudgingly given me had weakened me too much, or maybe they believed their numbers alone were enough to deter me. They weren't wrong. My body was sluggish, my wound still angry and swollen beneath the makeshift bandage. But it wasn't just that. I needed more time to formulate a plan. Plus, the antibiotics were working - I couldn't afford to lose access to them, not when sepsis felt like it was lurking just beneath my skin.

The hours blurred together as we moved, each one stitched with fear and exhaustion. They didn't treat me kindly, but they hadn't touched me like I feared they would. Not yet. Their crude jokes, lingering stares, and the way they casually discussed me when they thought I wasn't listening told me it was only a matter of time.

The new camp felt colder than the last. Not in temperature, but in humanity. The air itself seemed thinner, suffocated by the weight of cruelty. They'd settled in and around an old car garage, not too dissimilar to the truck stop.

"Well, aren't you tasty," a man from the new faction of the group sneered as I was led toward the doors. He was broad-shouldered with teeth yellowed from neglect and rot, his eyes filled with hunger that had nothing to do with food. "I'll be seein' you in my backseat, darlin'."

He licked his lips, and it took everything in me not to spit in his face. I wanted to. God, I wanted to. But I swallowed the rage because I needed to survive if I wanted the chance of ever finding Daryl.

Inside the garage, the atmosphere thickened. The men erupted into whistles and crude cheers, their voices bouncing off the concrete walls like echoes from hell. They whooped like I was a prize, not a person.

All but one of them.

A voice cut through the noise, rough as gravel soaked in whiskey but threaded with something softer. A voice I thought I'd never hear again.

"Claimed!"

At first, I thought I'd imagined it. My mind, frayed from days of pain, must've finally snapped, conjuring up the voice I'd ached to hear. But then I saw him.

Daryl.

His hair was tangled with sweat and dirt, his face shadowed by bruises and exhaustion. But his eyes - those sharp, fierce blue eyes - were unmistakable.

"Get yur fuckin' hands off her!" he roared, his body already in motion.

The fight was chaotic, a blur of fists and fury. Daryl wasn't armed, but he didn't need to be. His rage was a weapon in itself. He crashed into the man holding me, sending him sprawling to the floor with a sickening thud. More came at him, but he was relentless, a whirlwind of fury and desperation.

Something inside me snapped back into place. I found my fight. My fists flew, fueled by adrenaline, connecting with bone and flesh. I didn't care about the pain, the blood that smeared across my knuckles. All I cared about was fighting - fighting for us.

But it wasn't enough. There were too many. We were overwhelmed, dragged down by rough hands, pinned to the cold concrete. Daryl thrashed like a wild animal, refusing to give in even as they pressed his face to the floor.

"What's goin' on!?" a voice bellowed from somewhere deeper in the garage.

"She's for all of us," someone snarled, his voice thick with entitlement.

A man emerged from the shadows-a burly figure with shaggy gray hair and eyes like dark pits. The way he moved, slow and deliberate, told me he was in charge. He took his time, his gaze sliding from Daryl to me with a calculating glint.

"Explain yourself, Dixon," he demanded, his tone dangerously calm.

"Fuck you," Daryl spat, his lip bleeding, eyes blazing with defiance.

The tension thickened, the air buzzing with anticipation. One of the men whined like a petulant child, "He can't claim her. She's to share!"

Joe - as one of them called him - studied us both. I expected him to react with violence, to make an example of Daryl. But instead, he seemed... intrigued. His lips curled into a faint smirk as he watched Daryl struggle against the men restraining him.

"Awful keen about takin' this one for yourself, Dixon," he drawled.

Daryl didn't respond with words. His glare was answer enough.

Joe's decision came down like a weight, his voice cutting through the protests. "Claimed is claimed. You know the rules, boys. Hands off."

The uproar was immediate - angry voices, fists slamming against metal. But Joe's word seemed to be law, and no one dared to challenge him outright.

Rough hands released me, and Daryl was pulled to his feet. His eyes found mine instantly, and for a moment, the world disappeared. Just us. Just the miracle that we'd been brought back together.

"Daryl," I sobbed, the dam breaking. I dropped to my knees, unable to hold myself up under the weight of it all.

His injuries, the shock of seeing him here, the relief that he was alive, all too much to comprehend.

His hands were trembling as he reached for me, falling to his own knees with a choked breath. He pulled me into his arms so tightly it almost hurt, but I welcomed the pain. It meant he was real.

"Baby," he whispered, his voice raw. "I thought I'd lost ya."

I buried my face in his neck, inhaling the familiar mix of sweat, leather, and earth. Alive. He was alive.

"I thought I'd never see you again," I whispered, fingers tangling in his hair.

His hands framed my face, thumbs brushing away tears. "Can't believe yur here."

The rest of the world faded again. My lips found his. It was messy, desperate, wet with my tears. I kissed him like I'd die if I didn't, like I could pour all the broken pieces of me into him and be whole again. He kissed me back like he believed it, like I was the first breath after drowning.

"This is bullshit," someone grunted, dragging us back to reality.

Daryl was on his feet in an instant, pulling me up with him, holding me close like a shield and a promise all in one.

His eyes were a combination of furious and bereft as he properly took in my injuries.

"Ath," he whispered as he pulled me back into his chest, voice cracked and low. "I won't let 'em hurt ya. Not again."

His arms wrapped around me, pulling me into his chest with a gentleness that didn't match the rage trembling beneath his skin. His heart beat wildly in his chest. I could feel the restraint in his muscles, taut with the need to unleash hell on the men who'd done this to me. But there were too many of them, and we both knew it would be futile - for now.

I buried myself into him again, not caring about the jeering from the Claimers as they watched us with smug amusement. Their laughter was background noise, irrelevant in the face of the one thing that mattered: Daryl was here.

It wasn't until I shifted in his arms that I noticed Hershel propped weakly against a rust-streaked wall, his face pale and gaunt under the dim glow.

"Hershel," I gasped, grabbing Daryl's hand and pulling him toward the old man. "You're alive."

His eyes, dulled with exhaustion and pain, flicked to mine. "Athena," he rasped, his voice thin as paper. "Did you see Maggie? Beth?"

"I was with Beth," I whispered, the words tasting like ash in my mouth.

Hershel's face tensed. "Is she... dead?"

"No," I said, shaking my head. "She's just gone. Someone took her. I don't know where, but we'll find her."

It was a promise I wasn't sure I could keep, but it was all I had.

~

Night fell like a heavy blanket, suffocating and cold. The Claimers lounged lazily around the old garage, most of them sprawled in cars, their snores a discordant symphony of arrogance. Only two men kept watch, leaning against doorframes with rifles slung lazily across their shoulders.

They hadn't bothered to restrain or separate us. They didn't need to.

That was what made them so dangerous. They knew they greatly outnumbered us, out-armed us, knew we didn't have a chance.

I lay on the cold, oil-stained concrete, curled into Daryl's side. His arm was wrapped tightly around me, his grip like iron, as if letting go might make me vanish. I could feel the tension in him, the weight of decisions he wasn't ready to make. His thumb rubbed slow circles against my shoulder, just beneath the bullethole, like he was trying to soothe the hurt away with touch alone.

After what felt like hours of silence, he finally spoke.

"Merle?" he whispered, his voice rough, as if the word itself was a wound. "Did he get you out?"

"Yeah," I replied softly. "The fucker knocked me unconscious. Again."

Daryl's jaw clenched, his hand running through his hair in frustration.

"I know about the promise he made you," I continued quietly. "I'm still pissed at him, but I get it. He knew I wasn't leaving that prison without you."

His grip on me tightened. "M'sorry," he murmured. "I thought I could help Rick 'n' be right back to ya, but then the explosions... I never shoulda left ya."

"We're together now," I whispered, my fingers tracing the lines of his face. "I don't care about anything else."

He nodded, but his eyes said different.

"Where is he?" he asked after a beat.

"I don't know." My voice broke, the truth heavier than I expected.

I told him everything - about Beth being taken, about returning to the funeral home and finding it empty. I told him about drinking moonshine to drown the ache, about burning down the shack just to watch something die that wasn't me. How I'd had to shut myself down to keep breathing without him.

In return, he told me about the bus from the prison, packed with the dead. About finding Hershel. About falling in with the Claimers because it seemed safer than the alternative - until my arrival showed him what they were really capable of.

I curled myself into him, holding on to him for dear life as I felt myself falling into rest for the first time in days. Exhaustion claimed me, though Daryl stayed awake, his eyes sharp and watchful, like a sentinel guarding what little we had left.

"I'm gonna get ya away from here." he whispered as I drifted off.

~

When I woke, the first thing I did was reach for Daryl, my fingers brushing against the rough scruff of his face to make sure he wasn't imaginary. His eyes met mine, bloodshot and weary, but still burning with that same fierce intensity.

"Just checking this was real," I whispered, my thumb tracing the curve of his jaw. "I love you."

"I love ya," he murmured without hesitation, pressing a soft kiss to my lips.

Hershel stirred nearby, a weak groan escaping him. He looked worse than he had the night before, sweat beading on his forehead. Daryl was quickly at his side, gently lifting his head to offer him water, his tenderness a stark contrast to the brutality around us. He'd never spoken about it, but I knew he'd started to see Hershel as a father figure during our time at the prison.

From what Daryl had told me, a combination of his beating from The Governor, the trauma of not knowing where his daughters were, and dehydration, seemed to have put Hershel into a state of intense shock, or something worse.

"We're movin' out!" Joe's voice shattered the quiet like a gunshot, and the camp exploded into motion.

"Where we goin'?" Daryl asked, his voice low, controlled.

Joe sneered. "We got a score to settle. You two are gonna help."

~

The journey was a blur of dirt roads and suffocating tension. Most of the men rode motorcycles while Daryl and I were crammed into the back of an old truck. Hershel wasn't with us - they'd left him behind, too weak to be used for whatever situation they'd enlisted us for. I was uneasy about leaving him alone with those that had stayed at the garage, but we were given no choice.

Daryl was silent the whole way, his jaw clenched tight, his eyes dark with thoughts he wasn't ready to speak aloud. I knew what was eating at him the guilt, the rage, the helplessness. I felt it, too.

"Hey," I whispered as we trudged after the gang through the woods after abandoning the truck. "We'll figure this out."

No response.

"Daryl."

His fists clenched at his sides. "I'm gonna kill all of 'em for hurtin' ya."

"I'm okay," I lied.

"They tied ya up. Beat ya. They don't get away with that."

"I know. But right now, we focus on getting whatever this is done and getting back to Hershel. Then we'll get away, burn them all in their sleep."

His eyes met mine, something dark and determined flickering there. "I can't stand it. Knowin' what they did to ya." He sighed, voice bubbling with emotion.

I cupped his face in my hands. "They'll pay, but I'm not risking losing you again trying to make it right. We have to bide our time."

He nodded.

One of the men whistled sharply, signalling us to hurry.

I took a deep breath, and we walked towards the edge of the woods. My stomach twisted at not knowing what situation we were about to find ourselves embroiled in.

We pushed through the trees-and everything stopped.

Nothing could have prepared me for the scene that met us.

Rick. Michonne. Carl.

On their knees.

Guns to their heads.

Joe counting down from ten like it was I don't fucking know what.

Was this really happening?

My heart pounded with a mixture of emotions. They were alive, but for how long? What score did the gang have to settle? What were they going to try make us do?

I disregarded my last question. They weren't going to be able to force us to do anything. These were our people.

"Ten Mississippi. Nine Mississippi. Eight Mississippi." Joe counted.

"Stop!" I yelled before my brain had time to process.

Joe turned, smirking. "You're stoppin' me on eight, Dixon's bitch?"

Daryl moved in front of me, shielding me on instinct. "Joe, hold up. These people, yur gonna let 'em go. These are good people."

"Now, I think Lou would disagree with you on that. "Joe replied, sarcastically, "I'll, of course, have to speak for him and all 'cause your friend here strangled him in a bathroom. That makes you a liar Dixon. You know what I do to liars."

"You want blood, I get it. Take it from me, man. Come on." Daryl insisted, and my stomach leapt.

"No..." Was all I could stutter out.

I desperately didn't want to lose Rick, Michonne or Carl, but Daryl - I'd only just found him again. This wasn't happening. He wasn't doing this.

"No!" I growled, pushing my way in front of him. "If anyone has to die, kill me, not him."

Daryl grabbed me hard, pulling me back behind him. "No chance."

"Listen, it was me. It was just me." Rick begged, trying to save everyone but himself.

We were all martyrs today apparently.

"See, now that's right." Joe cackled demonically. "That's not some damn lie. Look, we can settle this. We're reasonable men. First, we're gonna beat Dixon and his bitch to death. Then we'll have our way with your girl. Then the boy. Then I'm gonna shoot you and then we'll be square."

Everything happened so fast after that.

Some of the men grabbed Daryl and I, us fighting ferociously to escape their grasp. We fought side by side, like we'd never been apart. Every movement was instinct, every breath shared between blood and sweat and survival.

Rick reared back and headbutted Joe, who had him from behind. He recoiled, stunned, before Rick slammed his fist into his jaw. Joe retaliated by whipping him hard across the face with his pistol, knocking him to the ground.

Michonne and Carl were struggling against their own captors. She sent hers flying with one hell of a ninja move, and he was out cold.

Joe pinned Rick to the hard tarmac, taunting him. "What the hell are ya gonna do now, sport?"

What Rick did next will forever be engrained in my memory.

He snapped. and bit into Joe's throat like an animal that had been pushed too far. He tore his teeth ferociously away, ripping the villainous man's carotid artery clean out, tearing flesh and spilling blood like a rabid wolf.

It was magnificent. Disgusting. But magnificent.

Joe dropped to the floor, and audible rattle of death emitting from him.

The shock of what had happened froze all of us, both sides, only for a second, before Daryl threw the man holding him to the ground, stomping on him brutally and repeatedly until he was no longer breathing.

Michonne managed to get hold of her gun, putting two more down, while I wrestled free and grabbed a pistol from the floor, firing until there was only one of the monsters left alive.

"I'll kill him. I'll-I'll kill him!" the man holding a terrified Carl tried to threaten.

"Let the boy go." Michonne demanded.

Rick swiped Joe's knife. "He's mine." He growled before lunging at the man, Carl wriggling free and fleeing into Michonne's arms in the process.

Rick ignored the man's desperate please for mercy, plunging Joe's knife into his gut, hauling the blade upward until he hit his collar bone, eviscerating him, before plunging the knife into him again repeatedly for good measure.

We looked at each other - Daryl, Michonne, Carl and I - stunned. The scene around us looked like it belonged in a horror movie.

Rick slumped to the ground, covered in gore, his chest heaving.

I stumbled into Daryl's arms, shaking. His body was surging with adrenaline, his shoulders trembling. He embraced me tightly, squeezing me into him.

"You wanted to kill them all," I whispered.

"Ain't all of 'em," he replied, his voice flat. "We gotta get Hershel."

~

The air was thick with the lingering scent of blood and gunpowder, tangled with the metallic sting of sweat drying on my skin. The adrenaline that had carried me through the chaos was fading, leaving only a raw ache in its place - a hollow space carved out by fear, anger, and the fragile relief of survival.

But we weren't done.

Not yet.

Hershel was still at the garage, left behind with whatever remained of the Claimers. I could feel the weight of it pressing down on both Daryl and me as we trudged through the woods, our steps silent except for the occasional snap of twigs beneath our boots.

We'd left Michonne and Carl to tend to a catatonic Rick, assuring them we'd be back. It was too dangerous to risk bringing them along. Plus, they needed time to regroup, to recover from what had just happened. We probably did, too, but we didn't have that luxury. This wasn't a rescue mission we could delay.

Daryl moved beside me, his hand in mine, but his knuckles white with tension.

His face was shadowed, hardened with the same resolve I'd seen when he stomped a man to death not an hour earlier. But beneath the layers of grit and blood, I could feel him - still Daryl. Still mine.

We reached the vehicles, and I'd have bet my life that Daryl would have climbed onto one of the bikes, but he didn't.

"The truck..?" I asked him, baffled.

"Yeah." He replied, not meeting my eyes.

"You don't wanna take a bike?"

I knew how devastated he must be to have lost his at the prison.

"Nah."

"But-"

"I ain't ridin' one of their damn bikes. Not after what they did to ya. We'll go in the truck. Ditch it for a new one when we can."

That made sense.

As the outline of the old garage crept into view through the trees, my stomach twisted into knots. It looked even more decrepit than before, like it knew the monsters that had taken shelter within its walls.

Daryl crouched low behind a fallen log, motioning for me to do the same. His breath was steady, controlled, but I could see the storm brewing behind his eyes.

"We go quiet," he whispered, voice barely audible. "Take 'em out before they know what hit 'em."

I nodded, gripping the small knife I'd tucked into my belt. My hands trembled slightly, but it wasn't fear - not the kind I used to know, anyway. This was different. Sharper. The kind of fear that grows when you've got something to lose.

We crept through the brush, inching closer. I could hear voices now-two men, maybe three, laughing softly over something unimportant, like they hadn't just tried to destroy everything I cared about.

They may have vastly outnumbered us before, but only a handful remained now - only those not deemed important enough to join Joe's score-settling mission - and we knew we could take them.

Daryl moved first, swift and silent like a shadow. He was on the first man before he could even register the movement, a new knife from one of the dead Claimers sinking deep into the soft flesh of his neck. The second man barely had time to reach for his weapon before I was on him, driving my also new blade into his side with every ounce of strength I had left.

The last man - a stout bastard with greasy hair - tried to run, but Daryl's knife found him before he made it two steps.

Silence fell again, broken only by the sound of my ragged breathing.

We didn't waste time searching the bodies.

"Hershel," Daryl whispered, his voice tight with urgency.

We pushed deeper into the garage, stepping over debris and discarded trash. And then we saw him.

Hershel was slumped against the far wall, his face pale and drawn, his beard matted with sweat. His eyes fluttered open as we approached, dull with fever.

"Athena? Daryl?" His voice was a fragile rasp, like dry leaves scraping against stone.

"We've got you," I whispered, dropping to my knees beside him. I cradled his head gently, my heart cracking at how fragile he felt in my arms.

Daryl crouched beside me, pulling out a bottle of water and carefully tipping it to Hershel's lips. "Come on, Hershel. Drink."

Hershel coughed but managed a few sips, his trembling hand grasping weakly at Daryl's wrist. "You came back," he croaked.

"Course we did," Daryl muttered, his voice gruff but soft around the edges.

There was no chance he'd ever consider abandoning Hershel. He meant too much to him, even though he tried to hide it.

We didn't stay long. Daryl lifted Hershel onto his back with a gentleness that contradicted the violence we'd just left behind. I followed closely, my knife still drawn, just in case.

~

By the time we driven back to the road where we'd left the others, Hershel was unconscious but breathing steadily. Michonne and Carl rushed to help, eyes scanning the old man in the back of the truck with relief.

"We'll take care of him," Carl assured quietly, his face etched with exhaustion.

I nodded, but my legs felt numb, my body running on fumes.

Daryl took my hand without a word, pulling me away from the others. We walked a little further into the woods until their sound faded, swallowed by the approaching night. Finally, when we were alone - truly alone for the first time, without a tense rescue mission underway - he stopped.

The weight of everything hit me at once.

I collapsed into him, my fingers grasping the fabric of his shirt like it was the only thing tethering me to the earth. He wrapped his arms around me, holding me so tightly it almost hurt, but I didn't care.

"I really thought I lost you," I whispered, my voice breaking. "I thought I'd never see you again."

His hand cupped the back of my head, his breath warm against my temple. "M'here," he murmured, his voice rough with emotion. "Ain't goin' nowhere."

I pulled back just enough to look at him, my fingers tracing the lines of dirt and blood on his face. His eyes were softer now, the storm settled into a quiet ache.

I leaned in and kissed him - this time, it wasn't desperate and messy like our frantic, ill-timed display at the garage.

This was delicate, slow, a realisation that we'd not only found each other, but thwarted a new enemy threatening to keep us apart. We'd found each other, alive, when we both thought it would never happen, and for now, we were safe.

He held me to him with one strong arm, his other in my hair, as he dipped his tongue into my mouth gently, lovingly. I latched my arms around his waist, clutching the back of his vest, needing to be closer to him than ever as we took our time showing each other how glad we were to be reunited.

When we finally broke apart, his nose rested against mine, his hands cradling my face like I was something fragile.

"I love ya so damn much." He whispered.

A/N: It's taken me a lot longer to write this chapter. I wanted to work in adding more description and really doing their reunion justice.

Did I go too far with trying to make it more fancy? 😂

Thank you so much for your votes and comments. They really do encourage me to keep writing.