Negan sat back in the folding chair as he drank from his water bottle. He found his mind wandering back to three nights ago. How he found Lucille dead, how he killed eight men without any hesitation, and now he was sitting inside a warehouse with two people he had very recently betrayed. Negan's eyes flickered down to his barbed wire baseball bat. It was still stained with the blood of those he killed. He dug deep into his own consciousness but he felt nothing. No remorse. No regret. Just an empty pit of darkness.
Laura walked up to Negan and pulled out a second folding chair, opening it and sitting in front of Negan. Laura seemed like a sweet young girl, someone Negan had no business even talking to, but even he had to admit, she had one hell of a swing. The bruise on his head was his reminder of that.
"I know my dad and I have been trying to give you space, but I wanted to let you know that we are thankful you came back. If you hadn't, I'm pretty sure my dad and I wouldn't be alive now."
"No thanks needed. I fucked up, and I had to fix it. Besides, I owed those assholes and they definitely had it coming."
Laura smiled, but Negan could tell that him killing those men affected her. She didn't seem the type to be around death. Who in their right mind would want to be, but that was the world they lived in. Negan saw that now thanks to Lucille. It was all about survival at this point, and Negan felt that he owed Laura and Franklin. They were doing good work, handing out medical supplies to any survivors they came across. Negan glanced around the warehouse, which was now pretty much empty. Franklin had left this morning to head to a local hospital to try to find some supplies. Negan and Laura wanted to go, but he insisted that he go alone.
Negan knew that he most likely just wanted to clear his head. Nearly getting killed and having his adopted daughter rapped by some biker thugs would be enough to make any father sick. At least that's what Negan thought. Lucille and him never did have any children, but the children that Negan taught, well if anything happened to them while he was around, that's how he would have felt. Negan found himself wondering if any of them managed to survive the collapse.
Laura kicked Negan softly, "Everything okay?"
"Just peachy. My head still hurts from where you hit me by the way."
Laura laughed, "Hopefully my dad can find some more painkillers to help with that."
"I'm just busting your balls, I'll be fine. Besides, I'm sure those biker assholes' heads hurt way more than mine. You should have seen their leader. After four hits, it was like a fine meat sauce had spilled out in the bar."
Laura cringed a bit and Negan saw that he had gone too far, "Sorry, didn't mean to get all psycho there. Just me trying to cope with the situation."
"I get it. I just hope that's the last time we have to deal with people like that."
Negan knew that it wouldn't be, and he knew deep down Laura did too. People preying on one another was going to only get worse as time moved on. Negan predicted that without rules and laws, some might even regress into their primal nature; becoming more beast than man. But Negan had a little hope that maybe Laura was right and the world wasn't complete shit and he was the only shitty person left in it.
A lone dark blue Harley Davidson motorcycle with white lighting across its body roared through the forest. A man with the sides of his head clean shaven and what hair he did have was long and pulled back in a messy ponytail; he was wearing sunglasses, a leather duster, with black cargo pants and black leather boots sat atop it. On both his hips were .45 revolvers, and strapped to the side of the motorcycle was a rusty four foot crowbar. The man rushed past several of the dead as they reached their hungry arms out at him.
The man pulled up to a bar in the middle of a small clearing. There were eighteen motorcycles. Nine well armed men wearing black leather vests stood guard outside, while six bodies of other bikers lay out in the middle of the parking lot. The man got off his motorcycle, taking his sunglasses off. His icy blue eye scanned the surroundings while his other eye was covered up with an eye patch and a small cloth bandaged hung out the side. He grabbed his crowbar and carried it over his shoulder as the nine guards all nodded at him.
"Where's my brother?" The man asked in a demanding tone.
"He's inside the bar, boss." One of the guards replied.
The man walked inside to see a large man crouched over a now headless biker. The biker had a vest that said 'Valak's Vipers.' The large man had long red hair, with his left side completely shaven. The man wore a vest that said 'Odin's Chosen.' The man in the duster approached him and patted him on the shoulder, "Well at least we know what happened to Craven and his boys."
The large man stood up and turned around. He had a long red beard that was braided into two forks, "The other gangs aren't going to like this brother."
"I know, but who could have seen this coming?" The man replied as he started poking Craven, "I never did like him anyway."
"You don't like anyone."
"Good point. So, Rob, I counted six bodies outside and Craven makes it seven. We're still one short."
"We can't locate his body." Rob replied, puffing out his chest as if he was getting ready to take a hard blow.
"I didn't know Craven's group very well, but do you think maybe one survived?"
"No way to tell, but if he did he would be on foot and have a three day lead on us. I can put our trackers on him if you want."
"That won't be necessary Rob. No, I want our trackers looking to find who did this and bring them to me. I will need to make an example of them. Hopefully whoever did this is linked to those so-called doctors handing out medical supplies like candy."
"If that's your order, Jon, then I'll let the others know."
Jon turned to Rob, he forced a smile from under his thick brown beard, "And let them know that if they fail me, they're going to end up like their friend Craven here. Elaina has a nasty temper."