Negan would be lying to himself if he didn't admit to feeling intense relief at seeing the blurry edges of a distant massive shape ahead of him sharpening into what was clearly an occupied home. Judith might be a thin little thing, but she was no lightweight, and it had been years since Negan had done any real physical activity. God damn but I miss football practice. It didn't hit him often, especially after so many years, but running back and forth across the field, getting in his players' faces, showing them how to run, dodge, block, and tackle had kept him in much better shape than most his age, and he could feel the difference now, trying to pull the reluctant Dog through the snow and wind while balancing Judith on his shoulder. All his muscles were trembling with cold and fatigue, and his injured leg threatened to buckle with each awkward step.

Did NOT survive the motherfucking end of the world and fucking dead people trying to snack on the rest of us just to freeze in a goddamned snowstorm. He kept an internal monologue going that was at times motivational and self-deprecating. Anything to keep his mind off the fact that little Judith's shivers had peaked and were now weakening – a sure sign that hypothermia was setting in – and the dog's whimpers were growing fainter, the animal's efforts to pull itself through the snow becoming increasingly labored.

But now a house with firelight behind the drawn curtains was within reach, 40 yards… 30 yards… and Negan hoped it was the same one Saddiq and the others had been making their way towards, because, between him and the Grimes girl, a doctor's attention was definitely in order.

And…Touchdown! He mentally cheered as he reached the front steps. It took a bit of shuffling to get himself, Judith, and Dog up the slippery stairs and across the icy porch, but he was finally banging on the door with a frozen fist, mentally apologizing to Dog when it yelped – Negan had yanked the rope tethered around the animal in his urgent efforts to get the occupants' attention.

Huh, should be feeling that more, he thought, glancing at his fist which was barely registering sensation as he slammed it against the hard wooden door. "Thank God," it was Rosita who opened the door. "We were trying to figure out a search party…" whatever else she might have said was lost on Negan as he forced his way past her, just stopping himself from physically shoving the expectant mother aside.

"Fireplace. Now. And someone take the damned Dog's leash off." Gracie and RJ had been racing toy cars on the hearth, but Negan ordered them to slide over, slightly softening his earlier gruffness, "Make a hole, Judy needs to warm up."

Leaning over to set Judith's feet on the floor proved too much for Negan's unsteady leg and he had to catch himself against the fireplace bricks to keep from falling over. Judith wasn't so lucky. Wrapped in the layers of her's and Negan's coats, and barely conscious from exposure to the elements, she buckled as soon as her feet touched the hardwood floor, and it was only Siddiq's quick reflexes that kept her from cracking her head against the mantle.

"I need dry clothes for both of them, blankets, and warm broth," Saddiq began assessing both patients with quick, well-practiced movements. "Where did you find her?"

"It's not like I know my way around here, Doc, and even if I did, visibility out there's for shit."

Negan used the wall to both prop himself up and slide down to sit next to the fireplace, awkwardly turning until he was nestled in the corner created by the wall and the low hearth and biting his tongue to keep the foulest of curses from slipping out in front of the kids when he felt the hole in his leg tear further open from the movement.

"Mother-," he breathed deeply to control his pain, "Here, get that shit off her and give her to me," he gestured weakly to the layers of coats still draped around the girl. He had just enough awareness to be concerned that he couldn't fully open his fists or control the tremors in his arms.

Saddiq started to protest even as he wrestled both Negan's and Judith's coats from her unresisting body, "Your leg, I need to get—"

"She needs body heat. Her sweater's dry enough, just the sweatpants and socks," Negan's assessment might have carried a bit more weight if he'd been better at hiding the way his teeth still chattered. But if the rest of the home's occupants were hesitant about the former leader of the Saviors giving orders, they kept silent. "I can hold her while you poke around down there."

The doctor only paused for a second or two before apparently agreeing with Negan's assessment. With a bit of shuffling and more than a few muffled curses, they worked together to get his jeans off, which were soaked through with icy water and blood (Good thing I didn't go commando today he wryly thought to himself), and helping arrange Judith in his lap so her back was against his chest, deftly swapping out her icy jeans for soft, dry pajama bottoms that were clearly too large for her. "Skin-to-skin is best; get your shirt off, we can keep her sweater on but raise the material in the back." Someone Negan didn't recognize brought over a blanket and helped arrange it as a barrier between his bare back and the wall. "I'm going to put her hands under her legs for now so you can rub her torso and arms. Do it gently; you don't need a lot of friction, the movement and physical contact is more about getting her alert, but it can also improve her circulation, and it will help yours, too."

Negan nodded and did the best he could, but could tell the circular motions he was trying to make as he rubbed warmth back into his little friend's chest and belly through her sweatshirt were irregular and shaky at best, and he still couldn't hold his hands fully open. Well, this fucking sucks, he acknowledged ruefully to himself as he tipped his head to murmur in the girl's ear.

"You could be helping, you know, seeing as how this is mostly your fault." He hoped goading her on in their familiar teasing would spark some life, but Judith's eyes barely fluttered and whatever reply she tried to whisper back was lost in the crackle of the flames and the rustling of fabric as Gabriel draped a blanket over the both of them and Saddiq pulled his medical bag close to Negan's injured leg.

"Should we move them in front of the fireplace?" Gabriel asked.

"No, too much heat too fast, especially for Judith. They're fine where they are," Saddiq turned back to Negan, "I'm going to have to see what we're dealing with here," the doctor warned. "Try to keep your leg as still as possible, but don't stop what you're doing with her. Sorry about the lack of privacy."

It was only then that Negan bothered to glance around him and realized that they had quite an audience. Nearly twenty people were crowded around the living room with more curious heads peeking in through the kitchen and dining areas. Negan figured half of Alexandria was crammed into Aaron's home at this point, and every last one of them was watching him with poorly-hidden-to-blatantly-open interest. Even Dog, who had settled himself on directly on the hearth and was allowing himself to be used as a pillow by RJ and Gracie, kept his watchful gaze on the unlikely pair. After so many years of near solitude and desperately craving an audience of any kind, Negan was surprised to find himself unnerved by all the attention.

But he was never one to back down from a challenge or let an otherwise daunting situation shake his confident exterior. They want a peek at the freak show, might as well give 'em their fucking money's worth. He gave the onlookers a toothy grin as a way of acknowledging their collective presence. Some were unnerved enough to look away, but most only glanced down for a moment before watching the interaction between Alexandria's longest-running convicted felon and it's unofficial first daughter.

"And for someone who was so concerned about her uncle Daryl's stupid mutt, you sure are falling down on the job now. I'm all for delegating to the minions, but, given that he's basically just squashing the shit out of the poor thing with his big old head, I'm not sure your five-year-old brother is really up to the task of Dog-sitting."

"Language," he finally heard her whisper, and it only made him grin more widely.

"That's not language. For all you know, RJ really is making Dog shit himself. I'd be having a hell of a time holding it in if someone were slamming their head into my gut." Both RJ and Gracie looked somewhat sheepish and picked their heads up from their furry would-be pillow, but Negan winked at them and shook his head slightly to let them both know they weren't in trouble. Dog, for his part, didn't seem to mind the attention in the slightest, only picking his head up as Judith reached unsteadily for his ears. She couldn't quite make the stretch, but Dog closed the distance, gently nudging her hand down until it was sandwiched between the dog's still chilled paws.

She giggled slightly, becoming increasingly more alert. Slight tremors began running through her small body, but Negan took these as a positive sign – she was warming up enough to start shivering again.

"Do you think Uncle Daryl will be mad at me?"

"For running out into a freaking blizzard for a dog that would have likely found shelter on its own, yes, he damn well better be mad at you." Negan tried to frown menacingly, but any weight it might have carried was lost when the doctor prodded a particularly tender spot on his leg and Negan couldn't contain his wince or gasped out, "Motherfucker… you sticking your whole damn hand in there or what, Doc?"

Since Negan's gaze never left Judith's face, Saddiq didn't bother to respond, but did try to gentle his ministrations even as he worked to pull splinters out of the gaping hole.

"And yes, I know, language, "Negan cut off Judith before she had a chance to retort.

"I shouldn't have let him run around. I should have kept him with me and then I could have put him in the barn with the other animals." The girl's cheeks were red with embarrassment as well as frostbite.

"Yeah, you should have, and next time you will." Negan didn't see any point coddling her when he never had before. Better to keep things normal. But he couldn't help himself from adding, "Still, it's not like the mutt's used to being on any kind of leash and he's not here often enough to know his way around. Would have probably happened even if you had been keeping a better eye on him. But if your Uncle Daryl is more concerned about this fleabag's safety than he is about yours, he's about to drop several points off my uncharacteristically high opinion of him." He raised his eyebrows in challenge until Judith finally relented and nodded in agreement.

She snuggled her head into his chest and moved her hands to grasp his, tucking them across her body and under her arms, then pulled the blanket up to her chin. Negan let her, sensing that she was warming up enough to no longer need him working on her circulation, even though the tips of her fingers still felt icy on the backs of his hands, which he knew were still too cold for comfort.

They sat in semi-comfortable silence for a few minutes, listening to the fire and the occasional rustling made as Saddiq pulled stitches through the torn flesh of Negan's leg.

"Do you think they found shelter?" her quiet question barely registered in his ear and yet he still sensed that it reverberated through the room's occupants.

"Your mom and the rest of them? Yeah, they'll be fine. Might have to take a detour, but they'll pull through."

"But what if it's not just the storm that's out there? Those people with the walker skins, the ones who killed our friends. What if they attack everyone while they're on the road? Or if they're waiting to attack at Hilltop once Mom and Uncle Daryl and King Ezekiel and Aunt Carol get there?"

"Truth?"

Sarcasm practically dripped from her reply, "No, it'd be much better if you started lying now."

He snickered, "Jesus, you are so much like your brother. But to answer your question, they won't. Alpha and her merry band of skin-wearing freaks are long gone, at least for the time being." Negan's declaration was confident, leaving no room for argument.

"You don't know that." Then again, this was Judith Grimes, and she was never one to back down, either.

Again, his eyebrows raised to challenge her tone, "Between the two of us, who's the only one with any kind of experience leading a community? Or keeping others in line with fear?"

Judith frowned and tipped her head back so she could look him in the eye. "You're not the same as her."

"No, I'm not. But that doesn't mean I don't understand her thinking and what she's done, or what she's doing now. Besides, unlike you, I actually listen. Folks around here said that this Alpha bitch thinks we should all be living like animals in the wild, yes?" He waited for Judith's nod. "Animals don't build fires. And a lot of them don't build homes, at least not the kind that can stand up to a long winter unless you're packing your own insulation like the fur ball here." He tipped his head to Dog, who had at some point gotten off the hearth and instead curled up on the floor next to their legs, with one paw resting, either protectively or possessively, over Judith's ankles. The younger children were still using him as a make-shift pillow and sharing a sleeping bag rolled out in front of the fire place.

Judith hesitantly agreed, "Uncle Daryl said that they didn't have any kind of houses or even tents. Like they just stopped walking and slept wherever they felt like. He said even he has more of a camp than that."

Negan rolled his eyes even though, with Judith once again facing forward, the gesture was lost on her, "Why am I not surprised? Point is, even if they did build a place to hunker down for the winter, they wouldn't be able to guarantee that the walker herds would stay put, and they depend on the dead for their way of living. So Alpha didn't just set the borders up willy-nilly. She didn't even do it just to terrorize the communities, although that and revenge were certainly part of her grand plan." He adjusted himself against the wall, settling in for what was likely going to be the rest of the night. "No, I think she put that border where it is and divided the land to keep us all in the North because she's exactly what she says she is – an alpha animal leading her pack. And she wanted to be sure she could safely do what she's always done with her fucked-up flock – migrate. Specifically, migrate south for the winter."

Negan kept his head tilted slightly back against the bricks as he felt, rather than saw, Judith shift to look towards him. "You think she's gone for good?"

Even with his eyes closed, Negan knew he had the entire room on the proverbial edge of their seats. And it was exactly how he wanted it. Michonne might have rejected his earlier attempts at providing her counsel, but the rest of Alexandria clearly hadn't gotten that memo, and Negan prided himself in knowing how to work a crowd.

"No." His voice echoed through the silence. "if she were smart, she'd move on and stay gone, migrate somewhere else come Spring. But she's stupid, and she's emotional, which makes her even more stupid. So she'll come back. There'll be a fight, and damn bloody one. She'll force it if we don't act first. So we'll fight, and she'll lose."

"Is that what you would do?" Judith shifted sideways in Negan's lap to look him in the eye.

"Thought you just said I wasn't like her."

"Thought you just said you understood her."

Negan grinned. God damn, but he loved how this little spitfire challenged him. "Understanding isn't agreeing. Your dad and I understood each other. Even at our worst, we always understood where the other was coming from. Part of leading, even if you're leading the wrong way like I was, is knowing people, how they think, what they need, why they do what they do and what they're likely do to based on what you do to them. I don't have to meet Alpha to know her. Her choices show who she is and what she is. And her choices prove she's an idiot, from the way she treats her daughter to the heads she sawed off and plopped on bloody poles, show me everything I need to know her. I can see that she's an idiot and still understand why she did it, probably better than she does herself."

"Is this really appropriate to be discussing with children?" Gabriel may have been the one to voice the question, but Negan's eyes were on the sole survivor of Alpha's attack, who had frozen while wrapping a bandage around the newly stitched injury and even the shadows of the room lit only by firelight couldn't hide how he'd paled.

Negan's eyes openly surveyed the group for the first time since Judith had regained consciousness before addressing the preacher directly. "First of all, it's child, not children. The other two zonked out about twenty minutes ago. Second, in case it's still somehow ridiculously unclear to you, this" he wagged his finger back and forth between himself and Judith," is not new, we've been friends for years now, and yes, Michonne knows. If Judy's ready to ask me questions, she's ready to hear my answers."

"She doesn't know you like we do." Rosita's glare was intense. "And what does it say about you that you'd make friends with a ten-year-old girl?"

If Rosita's glare was intense before, it was nothing compared to the dark look that now clouded Negan's face, "I have never, and will never, put my hands on a child, or anything else you might be implying with that fucked-up question." He forced himself to calm down, feeling Judith tense in his arms. "Judith is smart, funny, and doesn't take my shit, all qualities I admire in a friend. It's not like she can help being a kid, she's growing up as fast enough. I'm honest with her, I've never held anything back from her. Never held anything back about Glenn. Never held anything back about Abraham. About Daryl, any of it. So she knows when she asks me about things like these new enemies or her worries about her family being out there in the shit, she knows I'm not going to blow smoke up her ass."

"Why would you blow smoke up someone's ass? That's sounds really weird. And wrong." Judith's honest confusion made Negan laugh out loud and broke the tension that had settled on the room.

"You know, I have absolutely no idea why anyone would ever blow smoke up someone's ass. It would be completely freaky and just plain wrong, you are totally right about that. It's a figure of speech, means I won't lie to make you feel better. I tell you your Mom and the rest of them out there are fine because they are. I tell you Alpha's an idiot and she's going to fight and she's going to lose because she is and she will."

"But she killed all those people, you don't think she's dangerous?"

"Didn't say that. I said she's stupid. You can be stupid and still be dangerous. Stupid and violent is a particularly dangerous combination. And she is definitely violent. So we're in for a fight, and it's gonna be bad, worse than fighting me. I was violent, made bad choices, but I wasn't stupid. Rick and I had an understanding, we knew where the lines were and we knew that crossing them would be worse than losing."

"Lines?"

"The rules that keep us alive, the lines of basic decency that make us human. You don't go after the weak, the sick. You don't kill the elderly. You don't kill children. Not on purpose, not if you can avoid it. Fighting is for the fighters. And you kill only as many as you have to, to win. When your Dad started all the shit between us, he went after an outpost full of soldiers. And I didn't retaliate by coming into Alexandria, I waited until he and his best fighters were out on the road, and even then, I was choosy. Who could I kill and only have to kill one, or two, and have the rest fall in line? When we were openly at war and I decided to firebomb the shit out of Alexandria, I didn't sneak in. I drove up to the front gate, announced myself, gave people time for surrender. Because when your dad brought the fight to my home, he didn't shoot the families, he shot out the windows. Rules, lines that you just know are there."

He paused and took a breath before continuing, carefully keeping his eyes on Judith both to see how she was taking all this in and to deliberately keep from making eye contact with anyone else in the room. This was not their conversation; they were just the eavesdroppers. Eavesdroppers he wanted, of course, because at least one of them was going to report all this back to Michonne, but eavesdroppers nonetheless.

"Any leader who chooses to lead by fear is going to come to a point when they have to choose whether to cross those lines. I got there, your brother brought me there when he showed up at my Sanctuary and gunned down my people in my own damn yard. Anybody else, I would have killed 'em. Or brought them back to Alexandria to make your Dad do it for me. And then take it out on your Uncle Daryl like I had promised I would. But it was Carl, and for all his ballsy, badass bravado, he was just a kid. So I couldn't do it. And once your Dad knew that, saw that I'd tipped my hand, he knew he could fight back, and he did. Jesus led him to Hilltop and the Kingdom. Tara showed him Oceanside. You know the rest. Not saying it's the only reason I lost. Leading by fear is wrong. Tempting and kinda fun in the moment, but wrong. Which is why you get the nice house and I get the studio apartment with the super-drab concrete and bars motif."

"Bullshit." Rosita stood up and started across the room. "You can pull this holier-than-thou crap all you want, 'ooh, I'm not the monster, I only killed one or two people'… but we saw Oceanside. We all know what you did there. You don't get to sit there and spout all this sanctimonious shit about rules and lines like you're some noble warrior with a heart of gold, with a goddamned conscience, when we all know you're nothing but a piece of shit hypocrite! You're not better than Alpha, if you understand her so well it's because you're just like her. Except she never claimed to be anything than what she is, unlike you, trying to sell yourself as some kind of reformed… Goddamn it, I don't even know what to call you."

"Pregnancy brain, snatches the words right out of your mouth. Your Mom had the same problem. She actually refused to come see me until after RJ was born because it frustrated her so badly to get tongue-tied like that." Negan couldn't resist the dig, but he carefully spoke only to Judith. This was a crucial moment, and he knew it. However much this late-night talk had started out as being about making sure Judith was recovering from her time in the storm, the universe's scales had clearly tipped in his favor, giving him the kind of audience he hadn't enjoyed since his days at the Sanctuary. Judith might be parsing out his words with her usual sharp wit dulled only slightly by the late hour and the cold, but most of the house was eating from his hands. And he'd be damned if he let a smart-ass comment from the likes of Rosita Espinosa fuck things up for him now.

It was a gift, he knew, recognizing the critical moments and knowing when and how to seize them. And Negan had it. He'd used it when he was a coach, knowing how to turn a rag-tag group of undisciplined, rowdy teenage boys into a football team that barreled through state championships year after year. Fucking public high school and all the administrative bullshit that came with it, and he'd been the kids' pick for favorite teacher of the year for nine straight years in a row, and well on his way to a perfect ten when the world turned to shit. Working a room was a balancing act, but even a volatile, skeptical group like these Alexandrians could be brought around. There was a reason, after all, that the people of the Sanctuary had dropped to their knees when he entered the room, and it wasn't all from fear. They'd fucking loved him even when he had them shitting their pants. And if he could do that, why couldn't he bring Alexandria around to at least respecting him?

"Some people might have the common courtesy to recognize that, even though circumstances have us all crammed in together for warmth, you and I were having a private conversation over here, and that it would be rude to interrupt." Negan still make sure to look only at Judith but could see from the edges of his vision some people turn their heads slightly in embarrassment. "But… since I can see you're curious and said interruption actually helps prove my points about Alpha and her miserable band of misfits…" He sighed and dropped his gaze to his lap for a moment, "It's true. What happened at Oceanside, or to the people that would eventually build Oceanside was God-awful. Unforgivable. My fault. But not in the way most people might think."

Negan paused, considering his words. How to play this? Ultimately, it came back to Judith. Talk to her. He refocused on the one person he was comfortable showing his vulnerabilities to since losing Lucille, and the way her head was cocked to the side, listening and appraising him all at once, with the rest of her bundled up in the blanket that surrounded them both, was cute as all hell. Even with the heaviness of the subject at hand, he couldn't help grinning, "I didn't know him from before, but Simon was every bit my brother in arms the way your Uncle Daryl was for your Dad. And I knew he had a violent streak, but in those early days, with everything in chaos and no one knowing what was what or how long it, or any of us, would last, hell, he was a good man to have at my back. We took the Sanctuary, we held it. Built something, not just a place, but a code, a way of saving people, even from themselves – hell, especially from themselves. It was wrong, I know that now. But at the time, it made sense, and Simon was right there on board." He wasn't grinning anymore.

"The land where those people had set themselves up was good. Good for growing, good access to water. Resources we didn't have. There was a shit-ton of other things to do, why not delegate? Send Simon, he knew how things worked, have him pick a team, bring them in, standard message, done, move on. When they came back a couple of days later, I knew something had gone wrong. Took a while to get it out of them, what they'd done. They fought back. Well, no shit, Sherlock, strong people tend to do that when you bring 'em to their knees. All the more reason to fight to keep them, strong people make the whole group stronger." His voice dropped to a near-whisper, "The old men… the boys… a smart leader, strategic… I should have killed every last one of those idiotic fuckers, right then and there. But I thought, what good would that do? Won't change it. Won't bring anybody back. Just gotta make sure it doesn't happen again. I got this."

He realized that, at some point, he'd stopped looking at Judith, and he brought his gaze back to her piercing eyes. "Famous last words. I knew better. Be a lie to say I didn't know better even back then. People with that kind of violence in them, they don't change. It's not a habit they can grow out of. If anything, once they get a taste for it… But Simon was my boy, always had my back. And if the idea tickled at the back of my mind that, maybe, it was worse than they'd let on, that maybe some of them had done more to those survivors that just terrorize them by making them watch… well, no way to be sure… in truth, I didn't want to know.

"I told myself when those women disappeared, Good. Let Simon and the others see that this is what happens when you take it too far. Reigning it in wasn't just about the good and evil of it all, it was strategic. Cost us people, resources. Seemed to work, for a while. I kept them close, changed out who picked up supplies from the Kingdom. Sure as shit wasn't letting them bring in Alexandria without me there. But I knew better. Bad shit like that has a way of coming back. When the communities came together, Simon wanted to burn them all to the ground. Pick up stakes, start fresh somewhere else. Got to where I was spending as much time protecting the communities as I was fighting them. It all came to a head when he went behind my back, slaughtered an entire community of people who had flipped sides on us. Then tried to kill me and take out Hilltop before I could stop him. Finally got my shit together after that, killed Simon before he could anymore damage. But I still didn't deal with the rest, didn't think it mattered in the long run.

"Not too long before your Dad died, he was telling me about his bridge. Damn proud of it, of what it represented, what it could be. But he told me other things too, how certain people were slowing down work on the bridge, how they started disappearing, turning up dead. Former Saviors, a certain group who had never really been on board with his kumbaya way of living. He didn't know, couldn't know, 'cause I hadn't told him, but I saw the pattern. I don't know if it was the women of Oceanside finally getting their revenge, but I hope it was, like to think it they were finally settings things right in the only way they could. But even if they did, it's still far too little, too late. Because if I hadn't been such an arrogant asshole, thinking I could bring those people back from the lines I knew they'd crossed, a lot of people might still be alive. Maybe that bridge would have been finished and your Mom and the royalty brigade would have been able to use it to get here before the storm set in. Maybe your Dad… Well, a lot might have been different."

He and Judith stared at each other in silence for a beat before she leaned her head against his shoulder and tucked her arms around his chest. Not forgiving his past, but accepting him as she so often did. He let the quiet stretch on for several minutes, resting his chin on the top of her head.

"So, Alpha and her people, they're like Simon and his group?"

"Kind of. Not exactly. Alpha's like me, trying to keep her people together, leading through fear. Okay, fine. Wrong, of course," he stressed as her head popped out from under his chin so she could glare at him. "But objectively speaking… she made a choice. But then she's got Simon's violence tangled with a seriously obsessive need for dominance and a dangerous lack of impulse control. As for her people, I don't exactly know where they stand, but I very much doubt that an all-out war against four united and seriously pissed off communities is what they had in mind. She's probably already faced some scuffles from within, people challenging her leadership. Which, of course, only fuels her rage even more. And, like I said, she's an idiot."

He stared down at his young friend. "You don't see it, do you?"

Judith scrunched up her face and shook her head.

"And after all I've taught you…" He shook his head as though disappointed but his grin gave him away, and Judith grinned back even while trying to swallow a yawn.

"Hmm, maybe this should wait—"

"No, I wanna know. I want to get this," she yawned again.

Negan raised his eyebrow and looked as if he were weighing the decision, but he hadn't for one second forgotten the rest of his audience.

"Alright, but we're going to make this quick. We could both do with some shut-eye." Judith quickly nodded. "Good, so, that means you paying attention and no calling me out on my language." He sat up a bit and cracked his back before readjusting the blanket around them by tucking it under Judith's arms and around their waists, leaving both their hands free.

"Uh, you've cussed at least five times tonight that I haven't called you out for," she fired back, unconsciously mimicking Negan by sitting up a little straighter and turning to face him more fully.

"You saying you've been giving me a mulligan all this time? Good God damn, I could have been saying whatever fucked up shit popped into my head and you wouldn't have said a motherfucking word?"

"Negan!" The punch to his gut wasn't entirely unexpected, and he laughed.

"Just checking my limits." He raised his hands in mock surrender. Taking on what he affectionately referred to as his "teacher voice", he began, "Okay, we agree: Alpha is a terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad person and we hate her." Judith nodded in agreement. Negan's hands moved along with his words, "Take all those emotions and set them aside. We're looking at her leadership; we're looking at her choices. Everybody is made up of their words, intentions, and actions. What they say, what they want, and what they do. What she does tells us more about what she wants than her words ever will.

"Leading by fear is wrong," Negan's voice was overly sing-song and mocking a phrase that had clearly been shared between the two many times before tonight. "That said, there are merits to using fear to gain respect. It won't work forever, but you can use it as a starting point. But if you are going to lead by fear, there are two absolute, cardinal rules you can never, ever break."

He paused for effect before putting up a finger, "Rule #1, you cannot let yourself be ruled by fear. Rule #2, you cannot make it personal."

"People who are bullies are cowards. Every last one of them. And the shit parents who beat their kids are the most cowardly, piece-of-shit bullies out there. I have seen more than my fair share of abused kids, and their parents are all the same. They're weak, pathetic, useless sacks of shit. And deep down, they know it. They don't love their kids. They might claim to, try to fake it even. But they don't love them. Alpha does not love her daughter, probably never did. To her, the kid was nothing more than a trophy."

Negan mentally backpedaled when he saw Judith's confusion. Of course, a child of this new world didn't have rows of participation trophies lining her bedroom. Jesus Christ, the things these kids will never know about. "A trophy is a symbol, something you show off to people to prove you accomplished something. I'm your Dad's trophy, proof that he could bring the communities together, conquer evil, blah blah blah. Lydia is Alpha's fucked-up way of proving to herself that she could control something in her life, be stronger than someone else."

"Because Alpha never loved her own child and doesn't see her as being worth anything, she has no problem making a rule that anyone in her community who cannot control their children have to give them up. And for someone like Alpha, who clearly decided a long time ago that those lines we talked about earlier don't matter, that's fine. Terrible and wrong, but clearly working. Right up until you break your own code by not abandoning your daughter when part of your way of leading is making everyone else abandon their kids for any perceived sign of weakness. From that decision on, she fucked herself."

"Leading is all about people. You gotta know what they need, what they want, and convince them that you are the only person who can make those things happen. I have to give Alpha this much: she leads. And her people follow. She led them to give up the idea of homes, of places like this, of even the most basic comforts like sitting by a fire. She convinced them that the group was more important than not only the individual, but more important than their children. That is a level of power and control that I have never seen, and definitely never had."

"Because she has that control, she's able to sell her people on going to Hilltop the first time to get Lydia back. Maybe she sells it as a need to prove their strength to an outside group, a 'we can't let them think they can take one of ours and get away with it' thing. Maybe. But it's thin, real fucking thin. Even now, saying it out loud, I'm surprised it worked. Except, of course, it didn't work. Here comes the boyfriend, chasing after the girl. And if that's not enough, that Henry threw Alpha's show of dominance back in her face by coming after Lydia, Lydia up and leaves with the boy. And Lydia leaving is Alpha's biggest fear come to life, and she can't take it."

"A smart leader would never have come after the girl in the first place, given the rules they live by. But Alpha's not smart. She stupidly lets her emotions take control, all her fear, her self-doubt, her weakness and insecurity. And the proof is on the pikes – she put it all out on display."

"She can call it a border all she wants to, she can tell her people it was a strategic move, securing their safe passage south. After her series of fuck-ups, she'd need to do something big, dramatic. She's backed herself into a corner and, from her way of looking at things, heads on pikes makes as much sense as anything. Fine, what-the-fuck-ever. It's not like I have any room to judge. But calling it a border does not change the truth of what it really is. There is no point in history where putting heads on pikes is anything less than an act of war. You're either declaring the start of a war or the end of one. And if you're going to make a statement like that, you had damn well better be choosy about who you pick to put on display."

"And she could have picked anyone. We weren't ready. We did not see her coming. She walked right in the front door and no one suspected shit. So her options were wide open. A smart, strategic leader choosing to go this route thinks about the message she's about to send and who she's send it to. And even though Alpha doesn't honor those basic rules of human decency, she knows that we do. You don't kill the elderly. You don't kill children. You want to show your strength, you go after the strong. Not the leaders, you need them to keep the rest in line for you. But she would have had no trouble taking her time figuring out who the soldiers were. But who does Alpha choose? She could have shut down all the communities with this one thing. War declared and war won. But no, she's stupid, and she let her fears of weakness and failure take over, and instead of choosing the fighters, she wastes her big, dramatic gesture on one last slap in the face for her daughter."

"What those pikes are, really, is Alpha's family portrait, a monument of her failed relationship with Lydia. Set aside the three who tried to save the group and what you have left, every single one of them is driven by her hatred and fear of her daughter or of herself as a failed mother. Henry is obvious. Once Alpha decided to make this personal, there was no way Henry doesn't end up dead. The old woman –"

"Tammy Rose," Judith interrupted. "I liked her, she let me hold the baby, even asked if I had an idea of what to name him."

Negan gave a nod of acknowledgement, "Alright, Tammy Rose. Alpha could have picked any old person, but she chooses the mother who kept the child that was supposed to be left for dead. The mother that could love a baby that wasn't even hers. The Hilltop kids, they're right around the same age as her daughter, might have been friends someday. Revenge against her daughter, betraying her old pack for a new one. Enid and Frankie… two young women who went through loss and grief and trauma and came the other side strong, beautiful, happy. Everything that Lydia could be, now that she's broken free of her mom. If the Hilltop kids are Lydia's present, those two women were Lydia's future. And Tara, the leader who first took Lydia in, the woman leading a community who offered her home to a child in need, like Tammy Rose, something Alpha could never bring herself to be."

"She can't have been leading for as long as she has without knowing better. So Alpha knows all this, about not letting her fear take over and drive her choices. She doesn't care, that makes her stupid. She should care, she just killed herself and her entire community by not caring. There's no version of this creepy bedtime story where she gets to live. She screwed any chance of that. Either her own people will kill her because she broke their code, or we'll kill her for what she did to those poor sods in the field. Personally I'd vote for her own people knocking her off while they're away for the winter, because none of them have any reason to screw with the communities after she's gone, but I'm not enough of an optimist to believe we'd get that lucky."

The rest of the Alexandrians were silent, pondering Negan's assessment of their newest enemy. Judith was equally quiet for a bit while she processed Negan's latest lesson. "How'd you know that? About Frankie? That she was tough and went through bad things and all that? Or were you just guessing?"

"Not guessing. Frankie was my wife. One of them. Sweet girl, went through a lot of shit as a kid and then lost her whole family, pretty much all at once, right at the start. Tried not to let it get her down, though. She had a great sense of humor, this dry sarcastic wit with these one-liners you'd never see coming. Always cracked me up. And, Jesus, she had the cutest little breathy giggle every time we—" Negan cut himself off abruptly and feeling, for the first time in years, the faintest blush rising to his cheeks, "you don't need to know about that."

Judith's grin grew to Cheshire-cat proportions, "Is this a sex thing? Are you talking about sex?"

Shit. How the fuck did this conversation end up here? You're supposed to be in control, so keep it the fuck together. "What in the hell do you even know about sex anyway?"

"Nothing," she replied in a tone that clearly implied otherwise. "Mom said she'd talk to me about in a few years. But you always say that if I'm ready to ask questions, you'll answer…"

"Oh, no. No fucking way I am pissing off your mother by having The Talk with you. She would gut me from nuts to nose. Nuh-uh. Not happening."

"Wait, there's a Talk?"

"Yes, and it's terrible, been passed down for generations and it never helps anyone understand anything, but I'm still not going to be the one who gives it to you."

"But—"

"Fucking Christ, you're not going to drop this, are you?" He put his hands together as if in prayer and tapped them against his face to buy time. "Alright, fine. How about this? At the fair, did you see any kids that were more interesting to you than the others? Any of the boys catch your eye as being kinda cute? Or girls? Not judging."

Judith bit the inside of her bottom lip as she considered, "Well… there was one boy… he's from the Kingdom. He's a really good shot with a bow."

"That would impress you," Negan noted wryly. "Okay, now, close your eyes, picture his face, and try to imagine if you'd be excited about swallowing a glob of his spit as he stuck his tongue in your mouth."

"EWWW!" Judith pulled back, horrified, and started smacking Negan's arms repeatedly with both hands, "That's so gross! What is WRONG with you?!"

He couldn't help his laughter even as he tried to shush the girl before she woke the other kids with her undignified protests. All around the room, Negan could hear others trying to suppress their own giggles with varying degrees of success. At least we've lightened the mood. "Oh, you are definitely not ready for the Talk."

"Is that true? There's no way that's true. Is that true?"

"The spit part, no. If there's that much spit involved, you're doing it wrong." He sighed, mentally steeling himself. "I tell you what – After your Mom decides to talk to you about all this shit – AFTER – if you still have questions, you can ask and I will do my best to take it seriously and not gross you out too much. But only if your Mom is either there in the room while we talk or has come to me and told me to my face that she's okay with it. Getting stabbed in the leg by flying hunk of wood is one thing, being flayed open by your Mom's katana? Not on the table."

Judith gave a big sigh as if disappointed but then settled so she was laying sideways against Negan, so she couldn't have been too upset with him, "I guess that's fair."

"Gee, thanks. Can we get some sleep now?"

She shifted to a more comfortable position and pulled the blanket up as best she could. Negan grabbed the edge and yanked it up around her more securely and resigned himself to having her bony shoulder digging in under his arm for the few hours of sleep they might be able to grab before daylight. Around him, he could hear the shuffles of others settling down for the night as well.

"Do you really think they're coming back?"

He sighed. And we're back to this again. "Yes."

"And we'll have to fight?"

"Yes." He hoped the one-word answers would bring the questions to a close, but Judith was not to be deterred.

"But you think we'll win?"

"I think she'll lose, and it'll probably cost us, but yes, we'll win. Once everyone gets past the shock and grief, they're going to be pissed off. Speaking from experience, that is not something Alpha's ready for."

"Are you pissed off at her?"

"Very."

"So, you're going to fight, too? With us?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because it could have been you." Negan quietly spoke his fear into the growing shadows as the fire burned down. "No one saw her coming. She could have found you so easily. Seen you, strong and fierce and full of fire… So I will bash in the skulls of every single one of those motherfuckers and their dead, by myself, if that's what it takes to keep it from ever being you."

"Oh." Her whisper was muffled as she nuzzled into his chest, and he brought his hand up to steady her, stroking her head softly with a calloused thumb.

"I don't think you'll be alone," she whispered. "Alpha pissed off a lot of people."

Her attempt at dry humor wasn't her best work, but Negan appreciated it all the same and tried to return the favor, "Well, I supposed I could let Daryl get in few shots. Figure I owe him that much for locking him in a box all those years ago."

The elbow to his gut was entirely expected. "You're a jerk."

"No argument here. Can we please go to sleep now?"

"I'm trying. My head won't shut up."

"What do you need?" he asked with a long-suffering sigh.

"Tell me a story?"

"Sure, which one? Carl breaking into the Sanctuary? The time he got the better of me, saved everyone in Alexandria?"

"Tell me something you haven't told me before."

"Tall order, kid. You do realize, time-wise, I didn't get to know your brother for very long. Or your Dad, for that matter. Only so many stories to tell."

"I know. I guess I just… Never mind, I'll try to sleep now."

God Fucking Damnit. He wracked his brain for any scrap he could use as a suitable bedtime story for the worried little girl. Fucking lullaby would be easier.

"Did you know your mother used to sing to Carl when he was a kid? Not Michonne, your birth mom?"

The unexpected question surprised them both. "But – you didn't know her."

"No, no she died before I met your family. But Carl, when he was at the Sanctuary, he talked about her a bit. They used to take road trips when he was little. It was a thing people did, back when there was plenty of gas, get the whole family in the car and just go somewhere for the day, see the sights. More about spending time with family than getting to anyplace special. Anyway, your Dad, he apparently had horrible taste in music, but your Mom, she would sometimes sing to your brother. It was one of the things he missed the most about her."

"What did she sing?"

"Nothing special, just songs. Well, there was one… You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy, when skies are gray…

The rhythm was wrong and he was slightly off-key, but the soft, gentle baritone rumbled through his chest against the girl's ear, and she snuggled more deeply towards the sensation as she closed her eyes.

"You'll never know, dear, how much I love you. Please don't take my sunshine away…"

He sang the verse again, more whisper than sound, as he tightened his grip around her.

"Is that true?"

"It is."

He hummed the tune while wondering if Judith intended to ask more than her simply-worded question implied. Is the story true? The song? Negan mentally shrugged; not that it mattered, the answer was the same regardless, and, from the way her breathing deepened as she fully settled against his chest, it seemed the girl had all the answers she needed.

Thanks for reading my first story! Please Review!