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After everything that happened with the reapers, a lot were hurt, a lot were lost forever, but they were going back to Alexandria and that's all Daryl was trying to think about. He would have food to feed the kids and his community, he would see the kids and Carol and Kelly again. He would see everyone... That of course included Magna. It hurt to look at Kelly at the beggining, but now he knew she had the same feelings as he had on this situation: find Connie, she's alive, there's no doubt of that and they would find her. But Magna was a different thing. He knew Magna also wanted to find Connie and hoped she was still alive after they got separeted by the herd, but she was back and Connie wasn't. Daryl didn't like that. It felt like maybe the universe was telling him that if Magna was there... Connie wouldn't be. Even if he said that she was alive and he really hoped and thought she was... He was never one to have luck. The good things in his life always ended. Glenn was killed, Carl died, Rick was lost, Maggie went out to live somewhere else, Carol lived at the kingdom and stopped visiting, Michonne went on some mission. Now some of those people were back and he also had the kids, and now Lydia and Kelly... But this world wasn't one to giving him this many people back and not lose one of them. And the one he had lost was one of the most important ones. Connie, that ass kicker, bad ass, loving, sunshing, beautiful woman she was. If you had said to a 20 year old Daryl he was going to be in love with a black deaf woman and want to be together with her, he would have kicked your ass for inventing such a ridiculous statement. And here he was, 40 plus years on the back, loving that woman. Not that he had any courage to say that to her or do anything about it. Maybe one of these days he would find her and would have the courage to make a move... He didn't want to lose her again and not having said something to her. He wasn't the best at emotion sometimes, but maybe this would be one of the times he was. He just had to find her.
When Kelly found Connie after what felt like years of being apart, the emotional reunion had been a lot of crying and explaining a little bit what had happened. She was also reunited with Magna and was happy to know she had survived, Rosita was there too and they had become friends over the months because Connie would help with Coco sometimes, so it was good to see her and Carol, she kept repeting how sorry she was but Connie didn't blame her for anything, on the state Carol was, she would've done the same things, not thinking about any others because the only thing that mattered was hurting the person that had killed her, on Carol's case, son, on Connie's case, she would act like that if it had been Kelly or that kid she had and lost so many years ago.
She was excited to see everyone, when she asked about Yumiko, Kelly said she went on a mession with Eugene and the king and hadn't returned yet, so Connie was a little sad to know she wouldn't be reunited with her friend, but she was happy because she would probably see Daryl. But when they got to Alexandria, Connie didn't find him and she started questioning a lot of things. Where was he? Where were Aaron and father Gabriel? Why was she at Alexandria and not Hilltop?
They slowly answered her questions, so much had happened on the few weeks she was gone, she tried imagining it and those images were now getting mixed with her ptsd and panic was starting to get her when she felt tiny arms hugging her. Rj and Judith
"Aunt Connie! You're back!" Rj said and jumped excited and hugged her again
"We missed you" Judith signed with her "Uncle Daryl too but he's not here now. Come to the house before the storm gets here!" Judith started getting her in the house. They treated Virgil's wound and she got cleaned and into new clothes. The kids were getting nervous because of the storm and she was distracting them as well as she could. Rj was the one more interested in what she did, he was very scared. They called her to help them so she had to let the kids and help whatever way she could.
The next day, after a lot of trouble, the storm ended and they started a work of cleaning Alexandria as best as they could, they weren't able to do much so the next day there were still a lot of dead walkers around. A lot of people were going to the gates, Judith and Rj informed her that probably Daryl and the others were back and they went there to see them. She stayed there, happy to know he was back, but nervous, very nervous about what would happen with their relationship, how would he react, would he be happy to see her? She was so focused on her thougths and confusion that she didn't even see the smile Kelly had on her face, she knew perfectly well Daryl would be the happiest to see Connie and that the two would finally get over with the ridiculous little smiles and blushes and get together already, they behaved like total teenagers.
When Dog got in Alexandria, he was looking around and seeing everything, he knew that place, he knew those smells, but there was a certain smell he hadn't felt in a long time and was one of the ones he liked the most. He immediately ran to find the person it belonged too.
Dog had jumped on Connie and that made her laugh. He was so happy to see her he couldn't stop jumping and trying to lick her and she would smile and pet him
"I missed you too!!" she signed to him
She took a deep breath and did a sign Dog understood because she had teached it to him, Daryl. He walked her to him and when she saw him giving apples to the kids she was already smiling. When he saw her he dropped the apples he was holding and run towards her. They hugged like they had been apart for thousands of years and after a little talk, she called him to go walk around Alexandria with her and he accepted
"What was this mission you went to?"
"We were out of food, so I went with others, from Maggie's group most of them"
"I haven't met her yet! I did meet Hershel though, he is a very good kid!"
"Kelly and her were talking, she wants to meet you"
"The famous Maggie Rhee everyone talks about wants to meet me? I'm famous now!"
"Yeah you say that, famous journalist"
"Kelly exagerates, I'm telling you!"
"Sure"
"You're signing is so much better now" Connie signed softly after a moment of silence
"Had to keep learning, for Kelly and you"
"You... Thought about me?"
"I woulnd't give up on you, I just had to find you... Never stopped searching" he felt like it was a little easier to tell her this, only signing, with any other person he wouldn't have been able to even say a word
"Am I that special? For the famous Daryl Dixon to be searching for me?" she joked
"Yeah"
"Thank you" she said, a little more shy after what he had said
"Where were you?"
"I followed the herd for a long time, after that I just ran, passed out in the woods. Virgil found me and we walked together until we found a house... I'm not quite ready to express how terrible that house and the creatures it had were"
"Ok, take your time. Who's Virgil?"
"A man, said he knew Michonne, I'm not sure how. He says she helped him...and that he had done some terrible things on the past. I don't really know what, he's nice, he helped me"
"I should have helped you" Daryl whispered, he was looking down so Connie wouldn't read his lips
"What did you say? Have you already forgotten to look at me when you talk?" she again joked
"I said I'm glad he helped" he now went back to signing
"Oh... Ok" she was a little disapointed that it wasn't what she thought "You want to ask me some more of your questions?"
"Later"
She smiled with that. But then later never came, as the commonwealth got to Alexandria and with their new life, they barely talked now.
They were back to fighting in the same group, and now they were going to be the two of them separeted from the others to go in the sewers of Alexandria. She finished getting down the stairs but tripped the second she gave a first step. He caught her and saved her from getting sewer water all over her
"Thank you"
They walked in silence, sometimes a word or two about the mission they were doing was signed
"I never asked you the other questions"
"It's true. Do you want to ask them now?"
"I don't know, these sewers are......."
Connie stopped reading his signs when they got to a darker part of the tunel, her mind was starting to colapse again, and flashes of the cave and the haunted house and walkers and more walkers started haunting her.
When Daryl finished his sentence he noticed Connie wasn't paying attention. She stopped walking and put her hands over her head and was trying to shake something from it. He wasn't sure what to do, she was panicking and he normally would calm people by talking and she wouldn't hear him. When she started doing small noises of fear that's what made him jump to her and do whatever he could to help her, he never heard anything other then a small laugh sound coming from her, so hearing her being this desperate just made him be very scared. Slowly, the vibrations of his voice and the touches on her shoulders, arms and back, made her come back to reality. She oppened her eyes to find a terrified Daryl looking at her. She touched her forehead with his and let her tears fall. He kept talking with her, hoping the vibrations would help. After what felt like a long time, she wasn't crying anymore and slowly her eyes weren't so red so she looked at him, separeting their foreheads
"Thank you"
"Did what I could"
"Thank you" she said again
"You were in a really bad place... Realised I truly can't lose you"
Connie was surprised to see that statment, so she stayed silent for a while until Daryl started signing again
"I... I mean... I wasn't... I ain't... I... At the start... You were.... Merle had me... My family..." he awkardly tried to began explaining to her what he felt, he clearly had no idea how to do it
"Daryl, Daryl stop. It's ok... I know you care about me. We can talk better later"
"It's not that"
Connie's mind was to focused on the mission and his was totally focused on them, their relationship and the words he hadn't said. Suddenly, Connie felt his hand pulling her and then lips against her own. On the two seconds she understood what was going on and was going to start kissing him back, a vibration and, on Daryl's case the clear sound of a walker, made them get apart quickly. And they didn't talk about it after.
The battle was over, they still had to clean and organize a lot of things, a lot were hurt and some were lost, after facing everything on these 13 years of apocalypse, Daryl was just tired. He was laying down on his bed when he heard the door being open. Connie was tired of losing people or almost losing them and was tired of everything, she almost died so many times already, but this last times had hurt the most, because she now had Daryl and she loved Daryl, she had all this huge family that she would lose. She got in his room and tears were starting to fall down her face but that didn't stop her from walking to his bed and kissing him like her life depended on it. He kissed her back and when they had to stop to breath she started signing
"I love you. I can't keep pretending I don't want to be with you! I love you and I can't live in peace without telling you that! You make me feel like the best version of myself I had felt in years, you helped me in a lot of ways, you learned sign for me and I know you, you would never do that if you didn't care about me at all. I want to be with you, I want you to know everything I ever went to, even if you already know most of it. I want to take care of Lydia with you, she knows how to take care of herself, but she needs to be loved. By a family. And I want to be that family, if you wany that too"
"I want that, I want everything you do. I love you Connie"
They both smiled and kissed each other again
"But I want to go someplace else, I need to go someplace different, to look for more people, to discover some things, we can't be a family if I'll go"
"Stay for a little longer, just a month, we tell Lydia about ot all and we'll be a family for this month if she wants that. We also stay with the kids for a little longer and I'm pretty sure Lydia will take good care of them. And I'll go with you, if you let me, if you want to"
"And Kelly?"
"She'll be okay, she's ready to take anything and I will come back, I can't die and you can't either! We have to try our best to come back to our family"
"Ok. I like that"
She smiled and kissed him again. And that was it, all they needed was that. After 2 more months of happinnes in family, they left to find new places and live new adventures. Together.