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“I’m feeling generous, today, boys.” Negan’s voice boomed across the open hall, easily commanding the near fifty men in there. “See, I know y’all don’t get much chance for pussy these days. And me? I’m practically swimming in it,” he gleamed, wide and jovial as he paced back and forth between the ranks. “So, I figured, there’s plenty to go around!”
A rumble of appreciation made its way through the crowd, all laughs and jeers, without a hint of discontent. The fear in the air was palpable. Negan only ever brought so many of them together like this when someone was going to die, like that night in the woods not even a week before. No one spoke about it, but everyone knew a few of the men—the newer ones, mostly—had been taking longer trips to the bathroom since then, only to return, wiping spit and chunks of food from their mouths.
With how much Negan liked the sound of his own voice, it was often impossible to tell what he was leading up to. Despite all the talk of pussy, it wasn’t implausible to assume that someone was still going to end up with their head smashed in. All eyes lingered on Lucille as she passed, shifting between her place at Negan’s feet, or flung over his shoulder.
“See, you men are my best soldiers. What we did with those cunts from Alexandria? That was fucking awesome. Now, I refuse to let anyone say I don’t reward a job well done, so I’ve got a little gift I want to share. I know just what y’all need to get back in top form, so we can go out and do it all again next week, ain’t that right?”
Cheers sounded once more, nods moving through the sea of heads like a wave. The vague clarification settled some nerves, but not all. There was bound to be a catch. There was always a catch.
“You gotta know that I can’t just offer up one of my girls to you, though. Don’t want any of the sweet little things breaking in half under the weight of you. You understand.” It was an order, not a question. No one dared voice their disappointment. “But!” he began again, all theatrics and cheer, as a slyer kind of smile wormed its way onto his lips. “Not to worry. I have something much stronger. Gone days without breaking, you see. I’m hoping this exercise will help change that.”
“Dwight!” Negan yelled out to the doors behind him. “Bring him in.”
Daryl had woken from a pathetic amount of sleep only hours before—but he had been asleep. The music wasn’t on. The unexplained absence almost concerned him more than its insufferable presence. As footsteps echoed down the corridor and blocked out what little light he was afforded from beneath his cell door, he braced himself, stomach growling in some kind of Pavlovian joke. Clicking unlocked and cranking toward him, the door’s opening blinded him as always, leaving him blinking with his arms covering his eyes as he made out the familiar silhouette of Dwight in the doorway. Daryl waited for another dogfood sandwich to be strewn on the floor beside him, but it never came. As his eyes adjusted to the light, he saw a look of consternation on the other man’s burned face, in place of his usual gloating stare.
“You fucked up, man,” Dwight sighed.
It wasn’t a taunting insult like most days—he almost sounded pitying. Something about that hurt more than the abuse. That’s what he assumed this was about, anyway—having tried and failed to escape after Negan’s little test. His body still screamed out with every movement from the beating he’d taken as a result, unsure if his shivering was thanks to the blood loss or his own nakedness, having had his clothing privileges revoked shortly after.
Before Daryl could let out a grunt in response, Dwight produced a pair of cuffs from his jeans and dangled them before him. “Behind your back,” he ordered, eyes still harbouring that strange glint of regret.
He did as he was told, still knowing how to pick his battles, for the most part. As Dwight dragged him up and pushed him out into the hallway, he couldn’t even bring himself to care that the other guards could see his body so exposed, dick swinging between his bruised legs with every step. If nothing else, he could take some bitter pleasure in knowing that they could see how much bigger than them he was. The thought almost made him want to laugh—it sounded like something Abraham would say. Abraham. Abraham. God.
As they turned the corner, Dwight pushed him through a set of doors out into the open. Daryl recognised it as the same courtyard he’d had the shit kicked out of him in just days before. Days? Weeks? He couldn’t tell. Part of his mind whispered to him that it couldn’t have been more than twenty-four hours, but everything was so blurry now. He wasn’t sure it even mattered.
“Up against the wall,” Dwight commanded, pointing him where he wanted him.
Daryl bristled at the authority being lauded over him without so much as an explanation of what was happening, but forced his feet into action and traipsed over. Half of him hoped Dwight was just going to pull out a gun and shoot him in the back of the head. For a split second, as something made contact with his bare back, he thought it might have happened. As the cold hit him, though, he realised it was a stream of water being aimed at him, and not a rifle. He knew which of the two he would choose—if choice were a luxury he was afforded, these days—and it wasn’t the hose currently drenching him.
He held as still as he could, fighting the urge to run, as his body was soaked through, and thanked whatever God had yet to abandon humanity that it was a warm enough day for the icy chill not to drive him to hypothermia. The fragment of gratefulness was quickly shattered, however, as Dwight came up behind him and twisted his head around with a fistful of hair and forced the jet straight into his face, preventing him from breathing properly for at least three seconds longer than he could truly take. Upon having his head released, Daryl stumbled to the ground and panted to catch his breath, when he heard Dwight click his tongue and looked up to see him scowling.
“Come on,” he gestured him up with a roll of his eyes. Daryl pulled himself back to his feet, shaky, but compliant. That was, until Dwight's next order. “Bend over. Spread ‘em.”
Daryl shot back a disgusted look, only to receive an equally displeased expression in response.
“Look, you think I want to look at your rancid asshole, man? You’re fucking filthy. Just do it.”
Seething, Daryl couldn’t help but admit that the thought of being marginally cleaner was a pleasant one, even if this was the method for achieving it. His face burned, hot as a blazing furnace, slowly bending at the waist and propping his head up against the corrugated iron wall, as his cuffed hands reached down to pull his cheeks apart. He hardly had time to adjust to the shame of his position before the water started up again, hitting him in a way that made him shudder and squirm. He kept his legs pressed firmly together all the while, so as not to let the pressurised jet anywhere near his nether regions. He wasn’t sure if it was out of a fear for pain, or something else entirely.
He didn’t have time to ponder on it, however, as Dwight threw the hose to the side and reappeared at his side, hoisting him up once more. Neither spoke a word as Dwight led him into another building, down more labyrinthine corridors, leaving a trail of wet footprints. They stopped at a set of heavy double doors, and Dwight threw him down onto a chair with a glare to ‘wait there'. Out of Daryl's earshot, he murmured something to the guard by the door, who then slipped inside, seemingly to relay the information.
They waited wordlessly for a while, only sharing glances to grimace at one another every now and then. Daryl could tell that something had been planned, and he didn’t want to know what it was. Only then, in the still and quiet, could his body catch up with his brain and start to tremble in anticipation.
Dwight broke the silence. “You were right, you know.” Daryl looked up in momentary shock, as Dwight elaborated, “You should’ve killed me back then. Your first mistake was leaving whatever back-end, Hicksville town you came from. You haven’t stopped making them since.”
Daryl fought the urge to lurch up and grab the man. As if he had any idea what they’d gone through to get where they were—how much they’d lost. A mistake? He’d made his fair share of those, and he wasn’t going to deny it, but fighting to survive, to live? That wasn’t one of them.
Dwight paused to look Daryl directly in the eye, glare full of so much terror that even Daryl found himself gulping. “This didn’t have to happen,” Dwight warned. “You brought this on yourself.”
Before Daryl could ask what ‘this’ was, they were interrupted by a deep, echoing shout from within. “Dwight!” Negan's voice called out, muffled by the door. “Bring him in.”
With a quick, barely noticeable grimace, Dwight grabbed Daryl by the scruff of his neck and wrenched him to his feet, shoving him through the doors. What little blood seemed left in Daryl's veins turns cold in an instant upon seeing the mass gathering he’d been thrust before. He was sure he recognised faces. ‘Don't think where. Don't think where,’ he reminded himself. It was too late, though, for the sight of them all, spread out with a clearing in the centre, was all too similar to how it had been that night. Focusing to keep the memories at bay was the one thing that had stopped him going insane in his cell. He couldn’t let his mind turn to it, but he was, doubtless, before many of the same men who’d stood by and watched as Negan did what he had done to them. Daryl felt bile rise in his throat.
Swallowing it down, he gulped hard as Dwight pushed him through the crowd, toward the man himself. He hadn’t seen much of him since then. He hadn’t seen much of anyone, but Negan's absence had been the most noticeable. With a glance at the dictator's face, Daryl riled in seeing that he looked better than ever, his smile a dead giveaway of the horrors in wait. As they entered the clearing, Dwight pushed Daryl to his knees before the man, rough and violent. It took all the balance he had not to stumble onto his face, with his hands cuffed behind his back.
Negan looked down at the dishevelled prisoner and placed a large hand on his head, firmly ruffling his hair and shaking him like one might a big dog. “I was gonna ask if you’ve pissed your pants yet,” Negan murmured, only to him, “but…” he trailed off, gesturing to Daryl’s naked form. He stiffened, shuffling. His manhood was already tucked as best as it could be between his knees, but there was still more of him on display than he would ever want anyone to see—let alone the saviors. “Aww,” Negan cooed, angling back to address his men, “I think he's shy!”
A rumble of laughter descended upon the room, and Daryl flushed red in shame. This wasn’t what he thought it was, now, was it?
“Now, I know what you’re thinking—” Negan flashed that trademark smile, pearly whites practically glowing in the synthetic light— “this guy?” He clutched at a fistful of Daryl’s long, limp hair and wrenched his face up to show the men. “But he ain’t that bad once you get a good look at him. More importantly, he don’t get to say ‘no’ like my wives do.”
They perked back up at this, a few looking even more eager than before. Daryl, on the other hand, felt like he was going to be sick at the dawning realisation that this was, in fact, happening.
“The main thing, though, is that I ain’t gonna be satisfied until I’ve seen so many dicks up his ass, he starts throwing up cum. I want that thing gaping, understand? He ain’t ever gonna shit right again.” Negan paused, smiled, and looked him straight in the eye. “Do anything but kill him. I’m afraid I can’t allow anything so kind.”
Even Daryl’s impenetrable stoicism took a blow from that statement, expression collapsing in on itself as his lower lip began to tremble ever so slightly. Humiliation, alone, was nothing—he'd taken that too many times to count in his miserable life, both before and after. Pain, too. When combined in such great quantities as were surely awaiting him, though? That sent the slightest pang of fear down his spine.
The last time he’d been fucked, he’d been twelve years old. He didn’t think about it anymore, and he certainly didn’t talk about it. There had once been a time when he’d never thought life could ever get as bad as it had been in that moment—but over the past few days, alone, it had been beaten tenfold. Still, it was somehow about to get worse. He dreaded to think how much lower these depths could go.
“Take those cuffs off him,” Negan ordered Dwight. “Want to see my little tiger fighting.”
As Dwight jumped to it like the fucking lapdog he was, he said nothing, but shot Daryl a look. He knew exactly what it meant. ‘I tried to warn you.’
The instant his wrists were free, Daryl was shoved to the ground by the sole of Negan’s boot. The men around him laughed as his face smashed into the concrete. Before they could descend upon him, Negan retreated from the crowd and stepped up onto a platform, upon which sat a folding chair, swathed in light like a throne. He placed himself down, Dwight at his side, with a view of the unfolding scene.
Daryl knew there was no way out. Still, he crawled back up onto his feet, defensive and feral as his eyes darted about the hungry gazes of the men surrounding him. A few of them tried taunting him with thrown feints and shoves as they closed in, but he stood as firmly as his legs could hold him, fists above his face in a fighting stance. The first touch to make contact beyond a light tap came from behind, knocking him off balance as thick forearms braced against his chest, holding him in place while he writhed against the grip.
“Get off me!” he hissed, throwing his head back and kicking in futility.
More laughter. More bared teeth. They were approaching on all sides, like a tide coming in to drown those who’d gotten caught in the thick, muddy sand of the shore. Another reached out and caught his ankles to stop him bucking like a horse. The two holding him nodded at one another and flipped him over, slamming him back down to the ground. Various knees settled on his limbs and back and neck, holding him in place as another pushed through the crowd to reach the front.
“Hold ‘er down for me. I’m going in first.”
Daryl's eyes blew wide at the sound of a buckle being undone behind him. He’d never forgotten that sound, all these years, and it made him flinch at the best of times. This was not the best of times. He thrashed and flailed underneath the bodies weighing him down, but there were too many of them. A sting pricked at his eyes, but he refused to cry. As he looked up, pleading, he could see Negan sitting back leisurely, watching with a fierce intensity, and a bright grin upon his face.
Drawing him back to the inescapable present situation, came a hacking cough from the form behind him, as he spat down onto Daryl's ass, before trailing his finger through the spit and dragging it down into the cleft of his cheeks. His body felt as though it was going to explode from the tension in his muscles and the rapid rate at which his pulse was racing.
“Don’t…” he mumbled, voice barely above a whisper.
“What was that?” The man grabbed his head and pulled it back, spitting in his face, this time.
“Don't,” Daryl groaned, louder.
“Hey, Negan!” one of them shouted over, drawing their King’s attention. “He said ‘don’t’,” he mocked, mimicking Daryl's pained voice and gaining more laughs from the crowd.
Negan beamed. Standing and hopping down from his platform, the sea of men parted for him, and created a passage leading directly to where Daryl was held down, whimpering.
“I'm sorry, what was that, Daryl?” Negan asked, crouching before him with a finger beneath his jaw.
“Please,” Daryl breathed out, brows knitted in horror. “Please, don't.”
It was stupid, to beg. He knew that. He also knew it would be futile, but it didn’t stop him. For the first time, he felt himself craving the dark emptiness of his cell. Negan rose to his feet and looked about the men, scratching his beard in faux consideration. The room went silent as Negan dragged it out, thoughtful.
Daryl barely registered the movement from the man above before he felt the leather of Negan's boot make contact with his cheek, knocking his head to the side and sending drops of blood flying from his mouth. No one cheered. The air stayed deadly silent as Negan kicked again, from the other side, this time. Vision blurry and ears ringing, Daryl watched on as Negan glared down at him, resting his foot on his face.
“I told these men you wouldn’t say no, Daryl, and what do you go and do? You say no,” Negan tutted, like a disappointed parent. “Are you trying to make me a liar?”
Daryl could hardly think straight, gargling on his own blood as it spilled from his nose and gums. “No,” he seceded.
“Good.” The terrifying smile returned to Negan's face. “Now, try to be a bit more fucking enthusiastic, okay?” Hardly able to hear, hardly able to hold his own goddamn head up, Daryl didn’t respond. Negan squatted before him again, holding his head up for him with a harsh grip on his jaw. “Do you understand me, Daryl?”
Something inside Daryl died. “Yes,” he mumbled,.
“Yes, what?” he urged, gripping harder. “Speak when you are spoken to!” he added, in a yell, when Daryl took too long to respond.
If his aim was to bring Daryl back to his childhood, he was succeeding. He answered with the only response he’d ever been allowed to give, back then. “Yes, sir.”
Negan let out an astonished little laugh. “Fuck, man! I was going for ‘Yes, Negan,’ but you really blew it outta the park with that! Fuck me. Sir. I like the sound of that. Think I’m gonna get you to call me that all the time, from now on. That sound good?”
Daryl's mind was blank. His stomach was sinking, but he couldn’t tell why. It took at least ten seconds for him to understand anything Negan was saying, and by that point, he'd already rattled off another mindless ‘Yes, sir.’
“Good boy.”
A long buried part of him preened at the praise. The other wished he was dead.
As Negan got back up and turned to head back to his viewing perch, Daryl heard him tell the men, “Someone stick one in his mouth to shut him up. If he bites, cut off his ear.”
Negan shot back one last grin at his prisoner, and it felt like a sentence. The first tear spilled from Daryl's eyes. Everything around him seemed to be moving at half speed.
The man behind him pushed inside.
Time ramped back up to it’s regular pace in an instant, punctuated by Daryl's own guttural cry as his body was split in two, carved open to make space for another. He wanted to yell, beg, scream, ‘No, no, no,’ but he bit his tongue and honoured Negan's order. The steel blade of a knife pressed up against his cheek as another took his place at his front, dragging the sharp point down over his jaw and throat.
“You gonna be good?” the unknown savior asked, clutching his chin and forcing his mouth open.
Daryl pressed his eyes closed, sending more hot tears leaking out and running down his face. It took all his strength to nod. Knife resting back at his temple, his mouth was stuffed full, choking him down to the base in one movement.
Penetrated at both ends, the intrusion into his body became all he could feel. Violation consumed his mind, as hands and feet and knees and elbows seemed to rain down on his body. A number of the men had begun jacking themselves off around him, a few of them already shooting off and painting his back with their load. He’d made it all of twenty minutes with some semblance of cleanliness before once again becoming covered with filth. Perhaps it was his natural state. Perhaps it was what he deserved, after going out on his own like that—worrying Glenn and Rosita and Michonne into following him. Perhaps, if he hadn’t done it, if they hadn’t come after him, if Glenn hadn’t come after him—perhaps he’d still be alive.
The world fell out beneath him. Eyes clenched tightly shut, all he could feel was pressure, in his mouth, in his ass, in his legs, in his back. The slick slapping of flesh into his own—slick, undeniably, from injury, and not lubrication—drew muffled groans and cries from him with each movement. It hurt. Everything hurt.
His body went slack under the grip of countless pairs of hands upon his skin. Someone had grabbed his hand, pressed it into a fist, and begun fucking it, spurring on another to do the same on the other side, meaning he couldn’t even hold himself up. Every part of him felt used, like it wasn’t even his own body anymore—just a broken toy that happened to house a broken soul. Even that seemed at risk of being crushed and discarded, pushed out to make room for the hot fluid being pumped into him by the stranger at his hips. The man fucking his throat soon followed, holding his face in a vice grip as he shot straight down his neck, not even giving him the physical choice to spit or swallow. Both were replaced in an instant, thrusting in and burying the previous pair's cum deep inside before it had a chance to drip free.
It wasn’t long before he wasn’t even on the ground anymore, suspended in the air, impaled on four different men at once, spreading his limbs out like a crucifix as others supported his weight with one hand, their own cocks in the other. Panting and smacking and groaning was all Daryl could hear over his own sobs, in some sick cacophony of flesh and fervour. He willed his nerves to lose sensation, but the feeling was too severe. His skin was quickly becoming a collage of bruises, cuts, cum, and sweat, and his insides were surely even worse.
Hardly able to breathe through his nose from the pooling snot that accompanied his tears, he choked on every new intrusion to his throat, gagging and retching violently as they disregarded his suffocation and forced in anyway. All he wanted was for it to stop—for everything to stop, then and there. The Saviors had long since lowered their knives, too preoccupied with their own mounting releases, one after the other. He couldn’t help but think, though, that if one were still pressed up against his head, or neck, or chest, in that moment, he might not be able to hold himself back from leaning into it, pushing himself forward and impaling his wanting flesh upon that hard steel.
It would be a mercy, to be truly stabbed, over this cruel, torturous thrusting into his body. Let it be his heart, next time, that is penetrated, he thought. Not his brain. Let him return, body piloted by nothing but that clamouring desire for flesh and blood, and tear through these monsters once and for all. Daryl let his mind sink into the tender embrace of the image—men decimated and destroyed, Negan’s head the crowning jewel atop their heaping pile of bodies.
By the time it was over, Daryl was barely half-conscious, twitching in the foetal position, surrounded by a pool of blood and cum. His body looked more bruise than skin, droplets of sweat dancing along the blotchy, purple-blue stains and glimmering in the light.
The crowd had dissipated, backing away after their respective turns with him to watch from afar, unable to leave until dismissed. Negan, himself, rose from his pedestal and leapt down, approaching. Daryl didn’t look up to see the bulky figure looming over him, barely registering the shadow cast from its huge form, swallowing his own. Negan dropped to a squat and ran a hand through Daryl's damp hair, pushing it from his face. Daryl let out a wheezed gurgling sound as his face was softly tilted to look up at Negan's.
“Get it now, puppy? It’s not hard being my dog. All you gotta do is bark when I ask you to, and bite on my command.” Negan smiled, warm and deadly. “If you don’t do those few, simple things, I can’t be held responsible for what happens.”
‘Just kill me,’ Daryl thought, unable to form words or even struggle to move his jaw from the rough use.
As if reading his mind, Negan continued, “Death isn’t an option for you. It can always get worse. I hope you see that, now.” Negan's grip tightened, as he pulled Daryl’s face closer to his own, then leaned in to whisper in his ear. “I'm not gonna ask you now, since I doubt you can even fucking talk, but I will ask. I expect you know what the correct answer is, by now.”
Daryl groaned. Damn right he knew what the answer was.
‘Who are you?’
Daryl. Daryl fucking Dixon. That was all he’d ever been, and all he ever would be. These men would know his fucking name. One day, soon, it was going to be the last thing they ever heard.