Chapter 18
A truck, fitted with moderately effective anti-walker gear, roared through the empty streets of a long-forgotten town, narrowly avoiding abandoned cars and debris. David Bowie's "Rebel Rebel" blared as the truck swerved to hit a shambling walker, splattering gore over the windshield.
Negan flipped on the wipers and shot Rick a grin. "You know, I was never really a fan of the glam rock shit, but I'll admit this song has got the ol' juices flowing. Ya know?"
Rick shrugged.
"Jesus fuck, lighten up, ya dick. I like to get pumped up before I pummel some assholes. These guys don't carry guns and we've got goddamn armory in the back."
Daryl grumbled from his cramped spot jammed in the truck's backseat. "Means they're good enough at what they do that they don't need guns."
Negan inhaled with a hiss as a walker's head was clipped by the side mirror. "Ooooh, Daryl! That's fuckin' creepy as shit." He sighed and drummed a little on the steering wheel. "Fuck. Fuck, you're probably right there."
He flicked his eyes back to Kevin, also jammed in the back. "Listen up Kev, a good leader knows when to get their fuckin' hubris in check. I'm all pumped up from having a fuckton of guns and about to see ol' Rick the Dick here in action against someone else besides fuckin' me. But Daryl of all fuckin' people makes a good fuckin' point. What is it?"
Kevin screwed up his face, assessing the situation. Negan had decided he was a good kid with a good heart, just jumpy as shit and his nerves got the best of him in social situations. But in a gunfight, Kevin was surprisingly useful. Not necessarily the brightest bulb, but he got shit done. He wouldn't be quite to the standard of steady Dwight, who often acted as Negan's righthand man and kept a cool head, but the kid was growing on Negan. So, Negan had decided in that moment, roaring down the country roads with the Blue Ridge Mountains looming closer and closer, to dust off his teaching boots and kick some sense into the twitchy young man.
"Well… sir," Kevin started. "These…these guys have taken out groups before, I guess. Uh…. That guy that was found said there used to be more camps around but they got fucked, I guess. Sir. So… they got other methods. Probably knives and bows n' arrows an' that sort of shit for weapons. But they must be sneaky, using physi- uh…. psycho… uh…. Fucked-up-brain-shit war stuff to mess with people."
"Psychological warfare," Rick croaked. "Torment and torture to weaken the people, weaken defenses."
Negan smiled. "Fuckin' Bingo." He glanced down at Lucille, tucked near the door. "We know all about psycho-fuckin'-logical bullshit, don't we Rick?"
Rick just stared out of the window. The towns had disappeared, only trees now, increasing in density and size as they began to wind their way up the mountain road.
The silence in the truck grew, and soon Kevin filled the void with stories that varied from amusing to dull, punctuated occasionally by testing his radio. There were still responses from Sanctuary for awhile, but soon it turned only to static. Negan seized the moment to ponder his own situation. A cold flush shot through him as he realized the sacrifices he was making for a woman he'd barely met, kids he hardly knew. He had murdered two brothers recently for murky reasons, and now he had four good, solid men going into who knows what? What if this group changed their mind on weapons?
He slammed the brakes on, and everyone but Negan jolted forward.
"What is it, sir?" Kevin reached for his pistol immediately, eyes darting around wildly for a walker herd, an ambush, anything.
"This is fuckin' stupid. Impulsive. We should go back, get more of my men," Negan spoke in a quiet voice. Another silence filled the truck, but this time it was full of questions. Scary ones, that no one wanted answer to.
"We're less'n an hour away now," Daryl finally said. "We turn back now, we won't be back until midnight or so. Might all be dead then. Kids. Ain't stupid."
Rick nodded. "Maybe planned out a little better, sure. But they needed help hours ago, maybe days."
Negan gripped the steering wheel. "There was a gas station a ways back, when we still had a signal. I'll drop you off. Radio for a pick-up. It's my half-cocked idea, I'll go." What the fuck is happening to me?
He stared ahead at the twisting mountain road that snaked up into the horizon. He felt very strange, very unlike himself. Negan was not the martyr type, not at all. But something about the heavy trees reaching towards the orangish-red sky that lay ahead fill him with a dread he'd only felt a few times.
When he was ten, showing off for other kids in the neighborhood and his bike accidentally went over a large ravine. He broke an arm, fractured a femur, and had a massive concussion. As he waited for the ambulance, he saw his dead grandfather, who raised Negan as his own son when it was clear Negan's father never would. Pain is in your head, be strong, he told the young boy before he passed out.
When his first wife, his "before" wife Lucille, was diagnosed with cancer. He held her hand when she took her last shuddering breaths, tears in her eyes from grief, anger, or just the process of her body shutting down- the last time he had wept. The dread of being alone, truly no one else in the world that cared about Negan.
When he emerged from a week-long whiskey binge brought on by grief and looking at old photo albums, he opened the door of his quiet, empty suburban home only to see chaos outside – neighbors torn apart by mobs of walkers, cars on fire. Screaming. Blood. Guts. The little girl next door, Alice – she used to shriek and scream playing in the front yard in summer. Negan would be half annoyed, his own house empty and full of things that never were to be, the other half that feeling of content when children's joy is heard from a distance.
Alice shambled towards him, up the walkway overtaken by weeds. She was bloody, he almost reached out to help her, take her inside to safety. She reached her little hands towards him, one finger bent at an unnatural angle, oh God- but what was wrong with her eyes? Negan grabbed the baseball bat abandoned on his porch as little Alice snapped and snarled at him. Other neighbors with the same dead, milky eyes noticed and shambled towards him as well, some getting caught on the fencing or landscaped rocks. Soon little Alice and the rest of them decorated Negan's porch. He never could remember that part- it was just her little dead eyes, blackness, then coming to- covered in gore.
Negan felt a hand on his shoulder. He heard erratic breathing, and almost hollered at Kevin to pull it together. But it was his own breathing he heard, almost muffled out by the blood pounding through his veins like so many drums. He felt the hand acutely and glanced over- it belonged to Rick.
"These people we're helping-they're just kids. They need our help. We'll all go." Rick glanced back. "We know the risks. If anything, we'll just go scope out the area, then circle back to get a signal and radio for back-up." He reached out to put a hand on Negan's shoulder, but withdrew before making contact. "Come on Negan, we're wasting daylight."
He hated feeling vulnerable. More than that, he hated feeling this way with this particular company. Rick, whose group he terrorized into submission, was now comforting him. He'd laugh, except he didn't want to waste any precious oxygen. Get your shit together.
Negan cleared his throat and nodded solemnly. He glanced down at Lucille, the barbed wired gave a reassuring sparkle. "Fuck it, let's go."
He put the truck in gear and continued forward. The music in the car offered the only relief from the tense silence. Soon, they passed the bar from the gunfight. Negan slowed but didn't stop the truck. Shattered glass littered the ground, and a few blown out vehicles remained, but it looked picked clean now.
"Kids were busy," Kevin murmured.
Were. Hopefully still are. Alive, at least. Negan pushed up the main road, while Rick traced a finger over the map, the route traced in red marker.
"Should be a right-hand turn coming up here soon."
Negan took it, and slowed the car down. They were deep in the forest now. Pine permeated the car, even without the windows rolled down, and needles crunched noisily under the tires. There was a vague sign of tire tracks indicated by crushed needles and tiny glimpses of aging road beneath. With no one to maintain the roads, especially the little side roads, little saplings clustered closer and closer towards the crumbling asphalt, and dead needles formed the new road. Eventually, maybe with enough dirt, decaying needles, and destructive roots from the saplings, there would be no road. No trace of life anywhere.
"Next left…" Rick trailed off. "I guess follow the tire tracks. Hard to say where the next left would be."
But the tire tracks ended abruptly. "They'd probably sweep the tracks away," Daryl muttered. "Might be better to go on foot anyways now."
Negan agreed. "Alright, I want Daryl in front, then me. Kev and Rick, you hang behind."
Rick looked long and hard at the handgun that Kevin placed in his hand.
"Don't be gettin' any fuckin' ideas now, Rick."
He looked up and met Negan's eye. "Ain't the time to. We should keep some space, not too far but not too close that we're clustered targets."
"Agree." Negan slung a rifle across his back, and carefully lifted a heavy tote bag. He peeked inside to take quick stock – it was full of ammunition, igniter fluid and empty bottles wrapped in rags for Molotovs, and a handful of grenades to spare. One landmine nestled at the bottom, possibly defunct but possibly functional. Negan had no idea why the hell he decided to grab the ancient thing, the fuses were probably bad anyways, but now he was regretting packing it. After all, he was the son-of-a-bitch who was going to be hauling the goddamn bag of tricks.
He turned to the group, each one making last minute adjustments to straps, buckles, or weapons. Rick handed the map to Daryl, who spread it on the hood of the truck to study it momentarily.
"Alright, you see anything, remember the signals we went over on the drive here," Negan said. "Keep it low enough. Lucille's thirsty, and I want to give her some of these fuckers blood to drink." He flashed a smile, only expecting Kevin to meet it. To his surprise, Rick managed to wrestle a weak, uncomfortable smile.
Baby steps, Negan thought. He sincerely hoped he wouldn't regret the decision to give them guns. After all, Daryl and Rick could easily escape now, although Negan had sent his men to Alexandria as insurance. Rick wouldn't risk his people like that. Would I? A sour taste trickled into Negan's mouth and he swallowed hard.
Off they went into the woods. The truck abandoned conspicuously on the road, though the options were limited. It smelled vaguely like smoke, and it grew stronger as they trudged towards Littlechapel. Something sour twisted in Negan's belly – flashes of burned little corpses, raining ash. He pushed the images aside, and hoped it wasn't too late.
"Lucille, give me strength," he whispered. Pain is in your head, be strong.
They kept within eyesight, though it was surprisingly dark as the trees grew thicker. Daryl stopped up ahead and made a small hand signal, they all froze. Trap. He saw Daryl look around carefully, stepping gingerly before navigating around whatever it was. All Negan saw was some thin wire, but not the consequence of tripping that wire. They followed behind, avoiding the area. Daryl watched them like hawks, each step. Negan hated to admit it, but the hillbilly was useful as shit out here.
Negan's bag of tricks was growing heavy, but he carefully shifted it for relief and ignored his aching shoulder. Daryl stopped them again to navigate around another trap, this one easier for Negan to spot as well – simple wire with cans wrapped round treetrunks – more for walkers than humans, probably.
Distant gunfire pierced through the air, and a few birds in the distant treetops exploded in flight and frightened calls. They all crouched to the ground immediately, looking at each other to make sure it wasn't any of them as the target. All accounted for – Daryl crawled forward, inching through the trees. It had been fairly quiet, but now the distinct crack crack crack rang out, and return fire cracked back. Negan allowed a glimmer of hope – a chance that it wasn't too late if there was still back-and-forth. Maybe a last stand, but someone was still standing. He turned to Kevin and shot him a cheeky grin, but Kevin's mouth just hang agape, staring off in front of them.
Negan turned back, and saw Daryl with his hands up, though the person causing him to do that was out of sight. He saw Daryl set down his pistol – goddammit – and his lips were moving, but they were too far, speaking too quietly to make it out.
Shit, shit, shit. They quietly crept forward, ducking from tree to tree to get closer, get some sort of shot at the target that now held them up.
Negan could see the sweat on Daryl's face now, though he didn't look afraid. But then again, Negan had only seen a whisper of fear in the tough hick's face, and even that fleeted quickly. He unshouldered his rifle slowly, and spotted Rick circling around the other side, trapping the enemy, whoever it was.
Then Negan heard a voice, whisper-soft yet he could still make it out clearly.
"Any of you get any closer, he gets a bullet to the brain."
Fuck. Negan closed his eyes. How the fuck was he going to get out of this one?