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Saved by the bat

Emma oversteps, Negan's not amused, Simon takes sides

It wasn’t a knock on the door that woke her up in the middle of the night, it was someone kicking the goddamn door in. She basically jerked upright, hitting Simon in the face with her elbow in the process and nearly fell out of the bed. Simon mumbled something like what the hell and what is wrong with you but was alert enough to prevent her half naked ass to hit the floor.

“What,” Emma snapped. Whoever used a battering ram to knock, opened the door cautiously. “What you afraid you ran into, it’s,” one short look at the clock. “Jesus, 4 in the morning,” it was Laura.

“We need you downstairs,” you who? Her or Simon? The man stirred next to her.

“Someone dead,” he asked flatly, and Emma suspected that Laura, behind the door, first shook her head, realized she couldn’t be seen and then decided to speak up, judging by the time it took to answer the question.

“No,” Simon dropped down on his pillow again.

“It’s all yours,” he said. Emma stared at where she assumed his face was. Wow, chivalry was dead.

“Just great,” she said and climbed out of the bed and rummaged in some haphazardly piled up clothes on a chair. After the fourth time she pulled out some of Simons shit she just decided fuck it, who needs jeans. His shirts looked like a dress on her anyway. She slipped in her boots and stepped out. Laura stepped a step back. Over the last two months Emma had slowly but steadily piled up people behind her. Negan didn’t mind. His attitude towards how the common foot soldiers fell in line was pretty relaxed as long they did fall in line and as long as one word of him would send them tripping over themselves. And Emma needed some loyal men and women anyways. Laura was the newest of many she had whipped from Simon, Gavin, Regina, or even Negan himself, and she didn’t know how to behave around her yet. Emma ignored her submissive behavior, she even graciously overlooked the night time disturbance.

“So, what is it?” she asked while walking to the stairs. Laura wasn’t answering, and Emma looked over.

“You need to see it,” she just mumbled.

“This better be good,” Emma said. It wasn’t. Three minutes later Emma stared at the broken figure in front of her. No need to rush it now. Brandon looked like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar, Josh, now sporting a weird steam-punk looking hook on his hand, actually trembled, and Laura was still the poster child of silent subordination. They stood there, their gazes on the ground, with this one guy she knew was one of Negan’s, Alden or something, looking at her in an open challenge. Emma’s eyes flipped down on number 39. A mother and a son. The son looked half dead.

“Why isn’t he in the infirmary?” she asked in a casual chitchat tone. The mother looked up enraged.

“He did that,” she pointed at Alden. Or Holden? Jesus, they should wear name tags.

“I’m aware,” Emma answered. It was enough to shut the mother up. Emma had a reputation. Emma was fair “So?” Brandon was probably a bit fluxed with what was happening here.

“I,” he began to stutter. Emma sighed. Fine, why hoping they would start thinking for themselves after two years of Negan thinking for them now.

“Get him to the doc. No points, she can go, too,” Brandon and Josh hurried to get the boy up. He could not be older than 15, he was basically a kid. Jesus H. Christ. Emma palmed her face and leant against a small desk. She looked at the man hard. He didn’t look away. Great, one of those.

“Gimme your gun,” she said and of course he didn’t obey. Emma looked at the ceiling like an annoyed parent. He had no business in carrying a gun inside in the first place. Boy was this fucker in trouble. He just didn’t seem to realize it. He wanted it the hard way, he could have it. Emma was well aware that the average man had an advantage over her in a hand to hand combat nearly all of the times. If he wasn’t somehow incapacitated, or outrageously overweight, one well-aimed punch by a guy like Negan would break her jaw and knock her out, one by a guy like Simon might even kill her. There was a lot of muscle hiding behind these button downs. He had probably 60 pounds on her. But she had some things playing for her. She had the better technique, she was faster, and she always had the element of surprise, because she looked all kinds of cute and innocent until she sat on your chest. Ask Gary about that. She sucker-punched Alden in the gut and grabbed his sidearm rather casually throwing it to Laura who caught it without it going off. While he dropped to one knee and held his stomach she resumed her relaxed position.

“What happened?” she asked now and even put on a smile. He glared at her.

“Caught the little asshole with contraband,” he groaned. Seriously? In the middle of the night?

“What exactly,” she asked, and watched the guy scooting over to the duffle bag that probably contained all their earthly belonging. He produced two glasses of marmalade. Emma blinked, and she blinked again. SERIOUSLY?

“So, you decided to kick his ass?” she asked. She looked around. Most of the worker cots were just separated by blankets. She had an audience the second she entered the factory floor.

“That’s the rules,” no that weren’t. Even if he would have been caught sitting on a tank barely covered by a homemade quilt this wouldn’t be what the soldiers were supposed to do. These assholes got away with shit like that way too often. Emma had been pissed about it for a long time now. Her gaze felt on the sidearm Laura still held in her hand.

“You nearly beat a boy to death over two glasses of marmalade, by the authority of whom?” she asked and walked over taking it. Holden looked at that with squinted eyes.

“Negan,” he said boldly, and Emma checked the mag.

“Yeah, we will see about that,” she said toneless before she blew one of his knees out.

~

Emma wasn’t hiding. She was waiting for the big guy in the war room. Took him long enough. It was after sunset already. Simon was with him, too. He looked tense, worried, a bit annoyed. He might just be hungry, Emma could never tell. Negan spotted her and gave her a long, hard look. She still wore only one of Simons button downs and her boots, Alden’s handgun lay in front of her the mag removed and she had both her hands on the table. Emma wasn’t looking for a fight. She did it, she owned it. More people followed. Arat and Gary for instance, and Dwight. Emma glared at him. For a guy whose wife and sister-in-law had been workers downstairs for two years he recently didn’t give a flying shit about them.

“It came to my attention,” Emma looked at Negan. “That you permanently disabled Jerry,” wow, she hadn’t even been close.

“I did,” Emma said.

“For doing his fucking job?” Negan asked and now Emma wouldn’t take shit.

“You want me to answer the question in front of everyone or,” she made a gesture indicating everybody to skedaddle. Negan palmed is beard, shared looks with everyone in his posse, like at the end it wasn’t up to him.

“Leave,” he ordered, sitting down. Emma leant back, too. Four or five whole minutes they just stared at each other. Fine, she would talk first.

“You made rules, you drilled them into everyone, you even wrote them down,” in a surprisingly delicate handwriting. “You came up with a set of very extreme, very abhorrent punishments when somebody breaks the rules, so when people step outta line they will be a permanent reminder for others that you better fucking follow the rules. And when it comes to issues inside the Saviors we all follow through this routine meticulously, not exceptions, no matter how fucked up it is to maim a girl who just lost her baby, her boyfriend and recently her father just for wanting to see for herself where the boyfriend died. You steel, you gotta pay. And yet here we are, with half of the workers sporting bruises and contusions, even broken bones, because some Savior assholes think regular beatings for no reason whatsoever is a suitable way of handling them. We expect the workers to follow the rules and we ourselves allow our own soldiers to do whatever the fuck they want when it comes to the people downstairs. That Jerry asshole nearly killed the boy for a minor violation and he actually thinks that was perfectly adequate, that he was fucking entitled to do it. They take away points and they take away stuff, everything else, everything physical, is up to us,” she snapped. Negan looked taken aback a little. “I wasn’t punishing Jerry for doing his job, I was punishing him for doing yours. And in contrast to Jerry I was even in the right, I just skipped the part where I dangle him in front of everyone and do it publicly. Do I think some of your rules are arbitrary and excessive? Yes, I do, and you know I do, and I know you know I let the workers get off easy on occasion but cut them some goddamn slack. Because how it is right now they can use a break now and then, with the constant harassment through our own people. And I’m not doing this because I’m soft, I do it because it’s the smarter play. Next time someone will be dead and then what? When they think we play fast and loose with the rules they won’t feel safe, and a bunch of people that are scared and feel treated unfairly constantly will lash out, eventually. They aren’t blind. What you think they think when they see how Simon cuts of one of their fingers for stealing a bunch of eggs, but none of us doing anything when one of them is shoved down the stairs and breaks their clavicle for simply standing in the way. The workers are a lot of people, and tools and kitchen knives can cause damage enough. You wanna gun them down when they stand on our doorsteps demanding to lynch someone? Because we are heading there,” Negan’s face had become very hard at this. She had talked herself a bit in a rage here. She hadn’t even noticed Simon coming back in, now hovering behind Negan with a frown. She couldn’t tell if he was pissed off, too, like Negan, or here because he feared for her safety. She wasn’t done, though. Emma had already passed the point of no return. So, fuck it. “And then there’s the thing how it looks like when you just let your men presume they could make your decisions for you, maybe even better than you, and to where this will lead us if you let it go on much longer.”

“And to where will it lead us in your opinion?” he growled.

“To another Ryan,” she just said blankly. It could go anyway from here. Ob boy did she just pissed him off. She wasn’t the only one silently thinking that. She knew for a fact that Gavin had similar worries (yet less urgent since there were just a few workers in the Chem Plant and he treated them good enough) he just was too timid to speak up, like she had been, until now. This was not what she had planned the morning to go. Negan glared at her for what felt a million years. Suddenly he scoffed

“Jeez doll, tell me how you really feel. No one talks to me like that, you know that, right? Besides Simon and he earned that shit. What you heard?” he asked Simon never stopping looking at her with squinted eyes and a set jaw.

“Enough.”

“She talks to you like that?” okay, Emma was lost, was he pissed, impressed, ready to snap? She couldn’t tell anymore. Simon smiled a bit.

“Oh, she does,” he said.

“About shit like that, too?”

“No.”

“You think she’s right?” Simon didn’t want to do it, she had to give him that, he didn’t want to take sides. It wasn’t a real contest anyway. He would take Negan’s. No amount of sex would change that. He sighed and decided to choose his words wisely.

“She does have a point that some individuals, unauthorized, might take some liberties considering the natural pecking order which, sensu lato, will lead to an unnecessary agitation of the workers,” wait, what? She hadn’t seen that coming. Negan turned and studied his right-hand man with a contemplating look on his face. She wondered if he, too, was wondering what sensu lato meant. “Blowing out someone’s patella was uncalled for, but so was the beating,” that was surprisingly diplomatic for Simon.

“You think about that often?”

“Well, blowing out kneecaps is usually uncalled for. I could only think of two, maybe three occasions that one actually applies,” Simon had a way of dissipating the tension with Negan. The man couldn’t help it that a grin crawled up his face.

“Don’t get cute,” he said. Simon shrugged.

“It crossed my mind that roughhousing constantly might backfire one day, but honestly I didn’t give it much thought. Because what can they do, hm? But yes, she is right. When we have to resort to basic violence when they pick up the pitchforks we cut in our own flesh here. I ain’t start grooming Brussel sprouts. So maybe being a little nicer, a little fairer and a little bit more attentive of our own people when it comes down to the poor and dirty is not the worst of ideas,” Negan turned around and now looked at Simon bemused with a head tilt.

“Excuse my fucking French but saying shit like that doesn’t sound like you. Your girl got you whipped,” that earned him a condescending smile. “Fine,” he said and leant back. He didn’t seem angry anymore. What did just happen here? “Pray tell, doll. What do you suggest to ameliorate the conditions,” what the fuck was that? Did he decide to deliver the aforementioned slap with a Thesaurus?

“What?” Negan chuckled and shared a look with Simon who did that little shrug he always did when it came to her and her little antics.

“You think we need to change things, what do you propose,” he translated. “What did you tell your guys? Saw them cozying up with the workers often enough,” he looked at Negan for confirmation. The man only made a whatever hand gesture. He probably thought what they all were thinking, that it was way too early for shit like that.

“Simple, back the fuck off, no constant hovering and trying to enforce by all means. Just when they are called or see something major. And I reminded them what their fucking place is and where to draw the line. That’s basically it,” Negan kept looking at her for a long while.

“Sometimes you really fucking annoy me and I wanna hit you in the teeth,” he got up. “Fine, not sure when this whole mess turned into a conversation about how I have to run this fucking place, but here we fucking are. I will look into it, or even better, Simon will look into it,” he slapped the man on the shoulder and walked to the door. “Oh, and Emma,” he turned around again. “I like to think of myself as an approachable guy,” he really wasn’t. “So, in the future when you’re bottling something like that up until you decide to blow the cork into some poor fuckers’ leg, just open your pretty mouth and everybody will be happy. Understood?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Great. Now I’ll go and find one of my girls to whip me up some pancakes. Love me some fucking pancakes, tata,” he said and walked out of the room, not without slamming the door shut. Simon stood around for a while. When he was sure that Negan was truly gone he pinched the bridge of his nose.

“What the fuck, Em,” he said exasperated. “Do you want to piss him off? Cause that’s how you piss him off,” he dropped on a chair. “You even know how close you were to that going massively wrong for you?” he was probably right.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t do it intentionally, it’s like a talent,” Simon scoffed a bit. “Did you just take my side and backed me up?”

“Yeah, don’t mention it. What can I say. I got used to your face as it is. And maybe you have a point there,” she pursed her lips.

“Always so charming,” she said with a smile. “Maybe I do got you whipped.”

“Maybe you have. I sometimes get the impression I spend half of my time picking after you, bringing you stuff or thinking your ideas aren’t half as stupid as they actually are,” he said in a sulky tone. It wasn’t her fault that he was super anal with his room (with the only exception that one chair filled with clothes he was somehow blind to) or his car. Carson could probably perform surgery in it at any given time. “But seriously, this is like playing with fire. Scratch that, this is you juggling some burning chainsaws on a rope yelling come get me bitch into Fates’ face. Over a volcano.”

“Colorful metaphor.”

“You need to be a bit more careful how you talk to him, not necessarily what you say, but how you say it. And why are you wearing my shirt?” he tried to look under the table. “Do you even wear pants?”

Negan ripped the door open. This time he had Lucille on his shoulders. He also was accompanied by Dwight and Skinny Joey.

“What did she do this time,” Simon said flatly.

“Breakfast’s cancelled. Looks like the Satellite Outpost got in some trouble, so Regina sent help. Turns out they’re all dead.”

Notes

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