All Nightmare Long

Chapter 517

Author's Note: I may get Negan to Alexandria today! Mitch is bugging me and wants to run to Daryl. I am trying to tell him that is a bad idea, I mean come on it's Negan, he'd do bad things if he finds out. Let's see if he listens. Not sure if I'll get that far in this chapter. Please review.

Jes, Joey and Axel POV:

Jes walked the outside of the gates to Alexandria, marking off possible sniper spots. She turned with her weapon in the air when she heard footsteps. "What are you two doing here?" she asked as she lowered her weapon.

"We saw you go over the wall," Axel answered.

"And?" Jes asked.

"You shouldn't be out here alone," Joey answered. "Why are you out here?"

"You don't need to know," Jes answered.

"We're family, we care," Axel told her.

Jes turned and looked at them. "You're right, you are family, the closet thing I ever had. And it's because I care for you all that you don't need to know what I'm doing or thinking. Go back to Alexandria," she ordered.

"We can't leave you out here, not with Negan and his goons out here," Joey told her.

Jes tilted her head and laughed. "Joey, I can handle myself. I need you two to go back to Alexandria, and pretend that you didn't see me. You don't tell Rick that I was out here. I need you to trust me on this. Believe me I know what I'm doing, better than anyone else," she said.

Axel looked at Joey then at Jes before hearing something and turning quickly with his gun out, Jes and Joey following his move. "Whose there?"

"Easy, it's not the boogeyman," Garza answered as he came out with Cece.

"Depends on who you ask," Jes responded. "What are you doing here Garza? With her?" she asked nodding toward the teen.

"Her has a name, Cece," the teen answered. "Everyone mind putting down there guns?" she asked as she kept her gun steadied on them.

"Who the hell are you?" Axel demanded as he held his gun stead. "You know these people, Jes?"

Jes stared at them. "I'm acquainted with them, not enough for me not to accidently shoot them if they don't tell me what they are doing sneaking around here."

"We're here to help," Cece told her.

"I didn't ask for your help, so you guys can leave now," Jes said.

Garza put down his gun nodding for CeCe to do the same. "Look, you were right when you told us that we need to know what this guy Negan is up to. We need to be allies, we can help but we need to learn about this guy. Talk to the people who were in the line-up, starting with Joey there, learn about this guy's weaknesses."

Joey looked at him. "He had us on our knees for several hours and he makes really bad jokes," he said. "You aren't coming into Alexandria, neither one of you."

"You have a leader right? Why don't you let him make the decision?" CeCe asked.

Joey laughed. "I already know what his answer would be and this way you get to walk away with all your body parts. Right now isn't a good time."

"He's right, right now isn't a good time. No one that was there that night is ready to be interrogated, Garza," Jes told him.

Axel looked at Joey. "I take it they knew each other before this?"

"Yeah," Joey answered.

"I wasn't going to interrogate them, Sanchez, I was going to ask questions," Garza told her.

"I know how you ask questions," Jes told him. "It's not going to happen. Abraham and Glenn were our friends, our family, and it's only been three days. And what is the big change of heart? Thought Shaw wanted to keep you all in your little bubble? Hide from the world, keep you all safe, hell with the rest of us."

"It was Raph's idea, he knew that we need to be prepared," CeCe told her.

"So, why are you tagging along?" Jes asked.

"We thought you guys would be more willing to let us in if he was with someone innocent looking," CeCe told her. "I guess I was wrong."

"No one's innocent, not in this world," Joey said. He turned his head to noise coming from the main road. "Do you guys hear that?"

Garza took out a pair of binoculars from his bag and went closer focusing on the road. "You guys expecting company?" he asked as he handed Jes the binoculars.

Jes put them up to her face and counted trucks. "Negan."

"Didn't he say a week?" Axel asked.

"Yeah, he did," Joey said. "No surprise that he lied."

Jes turned around. "You two go back to Alexandria, if you high tale it, you can warn Rick. Go to the back side," she ordered Axel and Joey.

"Right," Joey nodded as both of them turned and took off home.

"We can help," CeCe insisted.

"Listen, I don't know you, and I don't know him, not anymore. You go back to the cemetery, you tell your people that I will come and tell them what they need to know about Negan when I am ready, and only then. I see you, any of you, I'm going to kill you. That's not a threat, that's a promise," she warned them. "I suggest you get going before they start looking out here," Jes told them as she ran toward Alexandria.

Lexi and Eugene's POV:

Lexi sat down across the table from Eugene, who was working on a radio. "Got a minute?" she asked.

Eugene didn't look up from what he was working on. "Not really, I want to get this fixed before they show up," he told her.

Lexi took the radio out of his hands. "You can spare a minute," she told him. "I never got to tell you thank you for the other night. You didn't have to yell at them to let go of me, to offer to take the beating for me, so thank you."

"I'm not brave," Eugene told her.

"That's what I'm telling you, you are brave. You aren't the same person you were in the train car at Terminus," Lexi told him.

"I was protecting family," Eugene told her honestly.

Lexi gave a small smile. "I'm glad you think of me that way, because that's what we are," she told him. "What are you doing with this thing anyway?" she asked nodding toward the radio.

"It's for when they come," Eugene answered.

Lexi looked down at her hands. "Have you slept since? I mean, I try, but every time I close my eyes, I can't stop seeing it," she told him.

"I haven't tried," Eugene responded.

"I wish I had went with Sasha, so I wouldn't be here, when he comes," Lexi admitted as she handed Eugene the radio back.

Rick, Jewel, Axel and Joey's POV:

Joey and Axel came into the house and looked around. "Mitch where is Rick and Jewel?"

Mitch looked up at him. "Upstairs, why what's wrong?"

"I'll go get them," Joey told Axel.

"What's going on?" Mitch demanded to know.

"Negan is on the way," Axel told him.

"What? I thought he said a week," Mitch said.

Joey stopped on the steps. "He's a crazed lunatic. We should have been expecting this," he said.

"Expecting what?" Jewel asked as she came to the top of the landing with Rick.

"Negan is on the way, with a huge convoy," Joey responded.

Jewel looked at Rick then at Mitch. "Mitch, go upstairs, help Mika get the girls ready, take them over to the Millers', and stay there."

"But I want to help," Mitch told her.

Axel put his hands on the boys shoulders. "We all have jobs to do, right now this is yours. I'll help you and Mika. I mean Mika's watching Jenny for Morgan right now plus got the two babies," he said as he guided him upstairs. "I'll keep them safe," Axel said as he passed Jewel.

Jewel nodded and mouthed thanks.

"How do you know he's on his way?" Rick demanded to know.

Joey glanced at Jewel then at Rick. "Jes was outside the gates alone. Axel and I saw her go over the gates, we followed her."

"Didn't I tell everyone not to leave Alexandria?" Rick questioned.

"Rick this isn't the time to get mad, it's not Joey's fault. Where's Jes?" Jewel asked.

"She didn't come back with us," Joey answered.

Jewel sighed as she walked downstairs with them.