Chapter Text
Carl never thought he’d do anything to harm Alexandria. The first time that he met Negan, oh, how he wanted to kill him. He could imagine how he’d do it in a million different ways. Take that damn bat and swing it right back at him. Watch the fear gather in his crazed, wrinkled eyes.
It was freezing out that night, clouded with a different kind of blizzard. An all-encompassing storm, whistling wind, crimson clung to ivory and swinging back and forth, staining the gravel, the faces of the Alexandrians. Terror so awful he could taste it on his tongue, that bitter weeping iron. You do not mess with the new world order.
He just wanted it to stop. He’d thought that maybe it was all some awful dream, the result of countless sleepless nights and stress from his and Enid’s argument.
But it was real, more so than anything he’d ever felt. Screams wracked the clearing, tinnitus inducing noise, like a veil of film had been shoved inside Carl’s ears. The dead, drawn in by all the sound, were quickly taken out by Negan’s dozens of men; just as fast as they showed up. It was, possibly, the first time Carl had ever been envious of a walker.
Negan had a distinct gaze, and it became twice as apparent when he knelt before him, taunted him. Something Carl couldn’t place, couldn’t figure out, no matter what angle he looked from. It was different from Terminus, lacking their frenzied hunger. This man was more calm, more calculated, more organized. He had an army that would fall at his feet.
Carl resisted the urge to wipe that smug grin off his face, dug his nails into his own palms instead. No sanctuary. There was never any sanctuary.
After it was over, he found himself unable to even look at his father. Rick’s eyes were far away, full of guilt, shock, remaining fear, whatever it was. A revolting concoction of Glenn and Abraham’s blood sprayed over his cheek, dripping down his jaw.
When Carl saw Glenn’s body—or, really, what was left of it, his head reduced to a puddle of vermillion mush—he couldn’t believe that it was the same person he’d known since he was ten years old. The man that had saved his father, all the way back when it started.
The man that should have lived long enough to hold his child.
Instead of staring into the damage, he helped the others drag the bodies back into the van. His eyes were practically closed the whole time, but he could still hear it, everything. Despite the fact that the forest clearing had fallen into a stunned, entirely deafening silence.
Well, silence apart from Maggie’s sniffling, her grunts as they dragged what remained of Glenn further and further down the path.
I bet you all thought you were gonna grow old together… Carl took another step, hauled the body up to get a better grip. Summer holidays… Picnics… Birthday parties.
Of course that’s what we thought, because that’s exactly what these people deserved. Carl couldn’t stop thinking that, over and over, again and again, like a record on a loop.
Another step, another agonizing breath. Maybe it was just the freezing temperatures, or the shock, but he couldn’t get enough air in his lungs.
Lighten up. At least cry a little.
Enid knew how these things went.
She was curled into a ball on the ground, hugging her knees. The closet was coated in dust and stagnant air, and she’d long since given up trying to force her way out. When Carl had locked her inside, he told her just to survive somehow, just to push through.
But, it had been hours, and no-one had come to let her out just yet—meaning, they weren’t back. This hopelessness was something she had felt countless times, and she’d voiced it; Alexandria was far too big to protect. Too many people, too many blind spots.
If you were worried about an attack, you wouldn’t be leaving, she had said, desperate. Maggie needed as many people with her through this as possible. A small part of her hoped that she could win him over.
And an even smaller part of her knew that this was pointless.
Do you know how far the Hilltop is? You know what could happen? That’s not happening to you, alright, I’m not gonna let it.
But you can’t prevent it, Enid thought. You couldn’t stop it from happening, what always happens.
Enid laid her head back against the wall, breathed a heavy sigh. Light dappled through the space between the door and the ground, golden morning rays, dust sifting through the plains of air.
At this point, Carl was going to get himself killed. His devotion served further than just that; it had become a wreckless warpath, a hunger for the Saviors’ blood. She saw it in him when he turned, stared her down, just before locking her in here. You hope they show up.
On the drive back, Carl stared out of the window. He laid down and tried to sleep, too, but he couldn’t. His mind was a bog of seeping mulch, weighing him down, just not enough to be submerged. Maggie was sobbing from the room at the end of the very short hall, clutching onto her stomach, half-fetal position.
Trees and concrete sped past his vision. The RV trailed on and on, slow as a crawl. It was a shock anyone could drive right now, so nobody told Aaron to hurry up, even if the Hilltop was still a good few miles away. The air was heavy, a looming presence, and the engine sputtered like a cough.
The others followed close behind on the road, driving the truck Negan had lent them, the two bodies in the back. He spotted a deer through the window, heading toward Alexandria, a brief flash of briar fur and round ears.
The truth was, Carl thought he was ready for an attack. They’d faced the Wolves, ruthless, and most of Alexandria had made it out just fine. They’d faced Terminus and the Governor and the Claimers and no matter how much destruction, how much damage, they had persevered.
Carl forced himself up from the pull-out bed, swung his legs onto the floor. Sasha and his father watched him go, but didn’t follow.
He couldn’t find the strength to talk, so when he reached Maggie’s side, he only laid a hand on her shoulder. He tried to offer a reassuring smile, too, but it came out crooked, more like an awkward twitch.
Maggie turned to look at him, green eyes stark against her tear-filled lashes. She reached for his hand, held it with two, and they sat like that for a few minutes. The RV trailed on and on.
She had told them, right after it happened, to prepare for a fight; to ready their defenses and end this. And he knew that she was right. That was the point of everything; just survive somehow.
Enid was waiting on the Grimes’ porch hours after Carol let her out of the closet, rocking in their chair, trying to reduce the uneasiness she felt by rereading her and Carl’s favorite comics. Wolf fight. But she couldn’t focus on them, the words just bled through, nonsensical—it was the gates she was really looking at, waiting for them to open again, for one of the people on watch to call out that they were back. She couldn’t get over the sensation, a pit in her stomach, heavy as a stone.
The grass shifted in the morning wind. The Alexandrians came out of their homes, most of them having gone without sleep. Things had been so different since Rick and his group were let in.
She shifted in her seat, laid her head back to look up at the awning, the boards, coated in water damage and rust. Rocking back and forth, again and again, she counted them. Thirty. Thirty-one. Thirty-two. But she kept losing it and having to begin again.
The wind had echoed her worries, birds screaming in the air; nobody could rest, not even them. Whispers of what happened and is Maggie okay, Enid could hear it as more and more people ventured out. The sky was crimson-orange, bleeding like pomegranates, dripping into dark blue.
Down below, once she settled into her seat on the makeshift guard tower, a deer scampered away, just barely visible over the tree line. Enid watched it go, clouds of gravel and dust in its wake.