It was pure instinct that drove the alchemist forward; he still didn't know why the reanimated that overran this world so aggressively pursued living humans, but it hadn't taken him long to guess he didn't want to find out why.
So, when Ash, the young bandit who had inadvertently freed the pressing horde of walking corpses from the other side of the door, had been sent sprawling and screaming in terror as the reanimated poured out form the other, he hadn't hesitated; a second to asses the situation, and then, he acted.
As the walking corpses fell over each other in their desperation to grasp their rotting hands on their quarry, Ed had snatched a stool that stood next to the library desk he'd bene leaning on, tossing it lengthwise at the horde, following it in as it knocked back several of the reanimated nearest Ash; one had unwittingly dodged it as it flopped down and grasped the girls boot and it yanked fer foot towards its gaping, decay coated maw hungrily.
Ash hadn't hesitated to drive her other foot straight down unto the top of its decay-softened skull, popping it with a sickly wet thunk that was lost on the crash of the stool into the wall of undead.
Ed took advantage if this tiniest length of breathing room to grasp ahold of the straps of the old military load bearing equipment Ash wore with his normal hand while he shoved an encroaching reanimated back with his auto-mail. The bandit girl didn't hesitate to start scrambling back while calling for the other two Saviors for aid.
Ed crouched and moved to slip under the grasping hands of the horde, but a corpse he hadn't seen grabbed ahold of his auto-mail and with surprising strength, yanked Edward metal hand to its mouth and tried to sink its yellowed teeth into it. Edward gaped in horror, just for moment, as the things teeth broke across the mechanics of his hand. Crying out in distrust and horror, he yanked his hand away, making the decayed creatures jaw snap away from its skulls, tearing it through its putrefying flesh as the things face disintegrated under the force of Ed yanking his auto-mail hand away.
Ed backstepped away, trying to put distance between himself and the undead, but the mob kept closing in, decayed arms outstretched, making those horrible, snarling gasping noises that were the creature only sound, beyond the slow, ghastly; echo of their footsteps. Ed suddenly felt that heavy wood of the library's front desk press into his back, arresting his progress. He gasped in fear; there was no way for him to scramble over in time but he tried anyway. He felt something grasp him by the ankle just as he was about to scramble over, but then a loud cracking roar burst out in the library, followed by another and another, Ed looking up just in time to be temporarily blinded by a muzzle flash, bright as sunburst in the growing shadows of the library, as Ash stood and sighted another reanimated with her rifle, atomizing it's brain with a single shot, and again and again, whittling through the crowd; Ed abruptly noticed the pressure on his leg was gone, and he threw himself behind the table as Ash's rifle rang out three more times as the girl finished off the undead.
Ed scrambled back to his feet in time to see another swarm of reanimated press through the open door, but they fell even quicker as another weapon joined the roar of Ash's rifle, with Arat joining in, having arrived and to stand next to the younger woman, her pistol held in steady to handed grip as she began picking off the walking corpses.
Ed watched the reanimated fall, a detached part of is mind noticing that the women were being careful to hit the creatures in the head with their shots.
That's how you kill them, he realized, you have to destroy the brain.
As if to prove his hypothesis, Negan suddenly weighed into the fray from the side, bashing in the skulls of two reanimated in quick succession with that savage club of his, before shoving a third back into the doorway; the bandit leader looked inside and whatever he saw made him slam the door shut and throw his weight against it as he yelled something back at the other two. Ed quickly grasped what was going on as the door started to shake as whatever was on the other side began to try and break through it.
He threw himself back over the desk, tripping when he hit the ground but quickly scrambling to his feet, not caring that he slid through the viscera of dispatched reanimated on the way. He slammed into the door next to Negan, helping to hold it with his auto-mail as he searched in his pants pocket with his other hand for the chalk he'd used to draw the alchemical circle upstairs. He let out a distressed moan as he realized the fragile implement had been crushed at some point. Still pushing desperately on the door, he frantically looked around for something else to use, found none, and in a flash of inspiration dragged his finger through the bloodied filth smeared across his clothing, using it to draw a hasty, crimson alchemical circle on the door.
He shoved the tall bandit leader holding the door shut and pointed away as he stepped back and clapped his hands together, with the big brute realizing what the alchemist wanted just in time to push himself away as Ed gathered his energy and slammed his hands unto the circle, morphing the door to a solid wall in a storm of blue energy.
Ed let a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding as he leaned forward on the door, bracing himself with his arms as he felt the creatures on the other side begin to fruitlessly pound against the wall he'd just trans-figured.
He almost jumped out of his skin when a heavy hand clapped him on the shoulder and spun him around, but he relaxed, incrementally, at least when he found himself face to face with the grinning Negan as the jovial bandit loudly said something to him that Ed couldn't comprehend, but he smiled back the man tiredly anyway, happy to be alive and that they had all made it through the short, sharp battle.
"…out-fucking-standing!" Negan concluded, not giving a flying fuck that the kid most likely hadn't understood a thing he had said to him. He smiled happily, mind alight with the possibilities of having someone who could create food from thin air and transfigure matter with the touch of his hands in his employ.
This was, of course, the part where a more rational and sane man might be having a mental breakdown, but as the leather jacket wearing tyrant had pointed out, his mental horizons had expanded quickly when his world had been overrun with rotting, undead stenches trying to eat him.
But right not, the existence of magic, or whatever the kid had just done, in the world seemed like just another card to be played in the game of survival he and his people were locked in, and fuck if it wasn't a trump card.
He noted by their vacant expressions of shock that Ash and even the unflappable Arat might not be quite so mentally flexible. He smirked as he slapped Edward on the shoulder and turned to the two other Saviors,
"Mind in the game now, ladies!" he shouted, bringing his companions out of their reverie.
He looked down at the bodies of the stenches; a few were dressed in the rotting remains of normal clothing but the rest were decked out in camouflage and high-end military equipment.
His smile widened as he took a hand held, two-way radio out of his jacket and radioed the other teams of saviors around the school,
"Heads up motherfuckers! Looks like this shit-hole was being used as a base by some hard-core Green-Beret-type military assholes before the end. Let's check all out all nooks and crannies and see what cool shit you can find me!"
He turned back to Edward, still smiling, and took out a small paper back book from his back pocket after tucking his radio away.
"Here kid, you can pay me back later." He said, before tossing the English to German dictionary to Edward.
Later on, Negan was still grinning as he watched the pile of loot building up outside the school in the fading light of the afternoon sun; a good stock of weapons, including heavy machine guns, military gear, cots, bedding, crates of MRE's, sandbags, tool's, barbed wire, communication gear, maps, medical supplies, water filters; one team had even reported finding a water tank on a trailer and a motor pool hidden in the school auto shop class area with a pair of two and half ton trucks and a few Humvee's.
"Looks like they were getting set up here for the long haul." Arat commented, as she watched her men stack their loot at Negans feet.
"Yeah. That room the kid sealed up? That led to the basement, boiler room, maybe. No idea how they all got down there."
"Want to crack it open? See what's down there?"
"Fuck no, that's greedy and greedy is fucking stupid. It'll be dark soon, and the locals," Negan pointed Lucille at a few stenches who were shambling towards the school from the nearby town, "Are fucking restless. 'Sides, don't tell me you want to be out in Eerie Country after dark?"
"The vehicles we found aren't going to start."
"Nothing to be done now. Time to load up. Take the guns and the food and we'll be back for the rest later on."
"You got it, Negan." Arat answered, before walking off to start ordering her Saviors into action loading the chosen loot unto their collection of pick-up trucks and vans.
"I…what of?" a hesitant voice asked Negan and he turned around to find Edward looking seriously up him- seriously the kid was kind of short, -and holding the language dictionary Negan and Arat had found.
"You," Negan pointed with Lucille, "With us." He said, simply and in a manner that brooked no debate.
Edward looked around at the empty, deserted town and the abandoned school.
He really didn't have much choice.
"Yes. But…I…questions." Edward answered in broken English that nonetheless impressed Negan; he'd handed the kid that book less then an hour ago. The rate he was grabbing ahold of the language was frankly frightening.
Negan grinned,
"Oh, you have no fucking idea."