A/N Anyone else been watching the tales of the walking dead show? Terry Crews is amazing and I'll be very upset if we don't see him again!
Chapter 109- United in Their Humanity.
-Rhys-
Carol is leaving this morning. Morgan turns up outside my room and asks me to accompany them, requesting through the door when I refuse to open it.
Why would I?
Everything can work out now.
Morgan finally seems to leave after the one-hundredth no I groan through the door.
After a few minutes of sitting in silence with my back pressed against the door, a knock comes from the other side.
"He's gone," Henry squeaks.
I stand up and open the door.
"Thanks, man," I sigh, ruffling his hair.
He shoves my hand away, laughing. "Quit it!"
I do, going to sit on the ragged sofa. Pumpkin jumps up and splays out on my lap after we exchange a short war of mistrustful squints and defensive growls. Henry sits next to me.
I'm not wearing my bandage. For some reason, I don't feel the need to hide my ear when Henry or Benjamin are around. Even Carl had to put up with me covering it every five seconds when he'd help me change the dressing. Still not sure why this is different.
"Why don't you want to go with Carol?" Henry asks.
"Because she sucks," I tell him honestly.
"She seems nice," Henry says, hunching his shoulders into a shrug.
I forget that no one here apart from Morgan and I knows who she really is.
"It's whatever," I tell him, dismissing the conversation. I put my feet up on the coffee table.
I side-eye him. "Don't you have school or something?"
"Don't you have choir practice?" he answers back.
"Alright, touché, wise ass."
His face gets all wide as he looks proud of himself. I laugh at him.
"Are you gonna go?" he asks me then. "To choir, I mean."
"Yeah," I grumble. "Ben and Ezekiel will feed me to Shiva if I blow it off again."
Henry nods.
"Are you going to go to school?" I ask.
"Yeah," he says, frowning at his knees.
"For the same reason?"
"Yeah," he sighs.
"Rhys!" Carmen sings my name and holds her arms wide when I wander into the classroom she hosts practice in. The short and very pregnant conductor gives me a smile that lights up the room. The living embodiment of a musical stereotype that she is.
The classroom is filled, as usual, with all manner of creative folk. A group of actors in the corner rehearse for A Midsummer Night's Dream show they're putting on next week, while a pair of painters argue over a picture of a naked man with his balls on display.
"Hi, guys." I wave at the choir, the group of seven smiling back from our corner of the room by the window. I always expect them to be mad when I miss more than one session in a row, but somehow, they never are. Every one of them waves back to me, some even clapping in joy at my return. Jess, a girl my age with long blonde plats and bright blue eyes who's sitting at the back of the room, twinkles her fingers at me.
"Thank goodness you're here!" Carmen takes me by the shoulders, squeezing them as she uses her round amber eyes to study me from my head to my toes. She shakes me by my shoulder that she hasn't yet released. "Rhys, Kevin has come down with bronchitis! I'll need you to take point on singing practice today!"
"W—what?" I splutter in her face.
"Don't worry, Kevin is fine!" She shakes me again.
I don't tell her that I couldn't be less worried about the guy with the sore throat right now.
"You want me to sing on my own?"
"Not entirely," she tells me, holding up her technicality finger. "The others will join you on the hook. You'll sing the rest solo."
"I don't know..."
"It's just a practice session," she urges. "You have a beautiful voice, and we're down our lead."
I think of something, frowning at her. "Did Ezekiel put you up to this?"
Her eyes flicker, and then she smiles. "No... but I will have to tell his majesty if you skip out again."
I groan.
"Thank you, Rhys!" She pipes at me, kissing both my cheeks before directing me by my shoulders to stand in the front and centre of the now assembled choir group.
She waves her fingers and counts to three.
"Well, it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe
If'n you don't know by now
And it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe
It'll never do somehow
When your rooster crows at the break of dawn
Look out your window and I'll be gone
You're the reason I'm a-travelling on
But don't think twice, it's all right...
Oh, don't think twice, it's all right...
And it ain't no use in turning on your light, babe
The light I never knew
And it ain't no use in a turning on your— What the shit?"
Everyone stops singing. Staring at me after my sudden outburst. Even the painters and actors swivel around to stare at me with bemused expressions, some laughing behind their hands. I'm not paying attention to any of them.
"Rhys?" Carmen says my name in a very confused voice, slowly lowering her mid-orchestrating hands. She and everyone else follow my fixed gaze to the classroom door. Everyone sees the boy standing in the hallway outside the window with cuts across his pale cheeks and dried blood splattered along his sweaty forehead. A pair of dirty spectacles resting on his nose.
He's staring at me.
"Mikey?" I inhale, choking on too much air.
I exit the classroom, crashing into Mikey with the tightest hug I can muster, worrying that I've cracked a rib when he winces. I'm laughing, telling him how I can't believe he's here. He hugs me back. I notice he's wearing one of Glenn's jackets, but I don't ask. He's real and here, and I can't stop beaming.
Before either of us can speak again, Richard comes racing around the corner, out of breath and glaring at Mikey.
"Kid... you can't just..." he pauses with a hand on his knee, a finger on his other hand held up for us to hold on as he tries to catch his breath.
"Richard?" I stare at him, still grinning, the chaos of what's happening starting to dawn on me.
When Richard catches his breath, he stands up straight. "The kid just finished meeting the King. He's been granted asylum... and I was taking him to the infirmary to get those wounds looked at when he just took off."
"I heard Rhys' voice," Mikey says, pointing to an open window in the classroom where the whole choir is still watching from.
"Wait, you know him?" Richard squints at me.
"Erm, yeah," I nod, thinking fast on my feet to not give away Alexandria's existence. "I know him," I laugh. "Me, Carol, and Morgan ran into him on the road."
Mikey glances at me but thankfully doesn't give the game away.
"Right," Richard says, nodding, not managing to find a smile. "He didn't tell Ezekiel much."
"There was a tiger," Mikey says to me like I might not know. "It's actually rather hard to talk when there's a tiger."
"You still need to go to the infirmary," Richard says.
"I told you," Mikey says to Richard, sounding older than he used to. More serious. "I'm not looking for asylum, and it's just a few scrapes."
Richard's frown seems to get worse.
"It's fine," I say. "I'll take him."
Richard looks almost relieved. "You sure?"
I nod.
Richard watches Mikey for a while before exhaling through his nose and giving me a strained nod. "Got your gun?"
"Back in the apartment, sure."
Once we're out of sight, I take Mikey back to Benjamin and Henry's apartment so we can talk privately. We're sitting on the sofa as I hold his wrist and gently dab at a line of cuts on his knuckles with a gauze pad. I examine his face. His eyes are sunken behind his glasses, and one looks bloodshot. His hair is dirty and longer than it was, covering his forehead and a deep cut — I brush his hair out the way and dab at it. He flinches for a moment before relaxing. He looks like he got into a fight with a bramble bush.
"Okay..." I say very slowly, a smile creeping across my lips. "I have at least a hundred questions."
He nods.
"But..." I go on, "I'm guessing you do, too."
"Yes," Mikey says, his voice crackly and deeper.
"Ask," I say.
He looks at me through those worn-out eyes. He shakes his head.
"Okay," I smile a little smaller, finding his demeanour is different, too. "You hungry?"
"Starving," he admits. "Ate a squirrel this morning."
"You caught a squirrel?" I laugh.
"I didn't pack enough food..."
"I'll bet," I say, raising an eyebrow. "Alexandria to here is a long trip on foot."
"Rhys..." Mikey mutters. "I didn't come from Alexandria."
My eyebrows knit together, and I scrunch my face up at him. Mikey grimaces a little at my confusion. Like he's just realised that I've been gone.
"I came from Hilltop," he says. "Maggie and Sasha are there. Enid, too."
"What?" I look him up and down. "Wait, is it the baby—" I feel my heart race, starting to panic a little. "Is it okay? Are they okay? Did Glenn send you here to get me? Is that why you're wearing his jacket? How did you even know where I—"
"Rhys..." Mikey whispers, avoiding my eyes. He pauses for a long time. "You have to come home."
"I—" I pause. "I can't yet... I've got people here that need me, and—"
"You've got people that need you at home," Mikey mutters.
"I know," I nod, shrugging the smallest of shrugs, "but you said Maggie's okay, right? Once everything is wrapped up here, I'll go back."
"Rhys..." Mikey looks miserable, every detail on his face telling me nothing's okay. He's scrunching up his face, and tears are building in the corners of his eyes. "Please," he croaks, "just come back with me."
Before I can say anything or ask him why he's trying to take this place from me, a million things suddenly happen at once. A knife strikes into the wall beside Mikey's head. The whole sofa flips over backwards, sending me tumbling off as Benjamin is yelling and tackling Mikey to the ground. Pumpkin, who was perched quite comfortably on Mikey's lap, is sent flying and screeching across the room with his tail puffed up until it looks like a stick of cotton candy. As Benjamin and Mikey brawl on the floor, Jenny, who had thrown the knife that almost killed Mikey, moves across the room, jabbing her crutch against Mikey's chest to pin him down, his eyes bulging out of his head. Everyone is yelling.
"Guys!" I bellow, jumping up and trying to push Ben off of Mikey. "Get off him!"
"Rhys..." Ben looks befuddled and out of breath. "Who...?"
"Who is that!" Jenny finishes for him, wobbling on her foot a little as she moves the end of her crutch to hover an inch from Mikey's nose.
I sigh, realising at this moment that the jig is officially up. I hang my head.
"This is Mikey... he's from another community."
"Huh?" Ben stares at me.
"My community," I add.
"What?" Jenny frowns, still swaying a little on one leg without her crutch on the ground.
"I'm from another community," I say, holding up my hands and letting the truth fly.
In their stunned state, Mikey swats away the crutch and shoves Ben aside, clambering to his feet and looking worried about another a fight. The other two go back to looking the same.
"It's fine," I urge them all. Standing between the two sides before war breaks out in the living room. "Ben, Jenny... this is Mikey, he's family. Mikey, this is Benjamin and Jenny... they're also like family. Please don't kill each other."
They all seem to deflate a little.
I stand in the silence with them until Jen swats my arm with her crutch.
"Ow!" I howl.
"Asshole," she glares. "Why didn't you tell us you were from another community?"
"Because," I grumble, rubbing my shoulder and scowling at her even though I deserve it. Deciding not to give her an actual answer.
"Because?" she glares at me, not letting it go.
"We were just protecting it at first," I say. "Then it just got too complicated to tell you the truth."
Jenny calms down a little. The four of us sit at the kitchen table and talk. I tell them everything I can think of, and Mikey fills in the rest. At some point, Ben tells Mikey to go take a shower, saying that we can eat after. The three of us sit in silence while the water runs in the other room. Jen tells a joke to lighten the mood at some point, the three of us laughing at it when Mikey steps back out.
He watches us quietly from the bathroom door.
"Man," Ben shakes his head, "that's a lot."
"Yeah," Jenny and I say together.
"Sorry for throwing a knife at your head," Jenny grunts in Mikey's direction as he sits at the table with us.
"Thanks for missing," he replies.
"I didn't," she tells him. "Just didn't want to get blood on the wall."
Mikey laughs, but I mutter that she's probably not joking.
Benjamin and jenny step into the kitchen to make lunch. They're only a few feet from the table, so Mikey leans in to whisper.
"I'm sorry," he tells me.
"Why?" I frown.
"You—" he smiles a little. "I haven't seen you this happy in a long while. This place must be great. I'm sorry that I'm asking you to leave."
"Mikey..." I stare at him. "What happened? Is everyone back home okay?"
He looks around the room, petting Pumpkin when he claws his way up his leg and onto his lap, seemingly recovered from being flung earlier.
"The Saviors... we didn't get them all. They caught us by surprise," he tells me, pausing for a long time again. "Alexandria... we provide for them now."
"Fuck..." I shrink, feeling like the world is about to come crashing down on me.
"Is Carol here?" he asks then.
"No," I say. "She was, but... she left this morning."
"And Morgan?"
I laugh. "Oh yeah, Morgan's here. Should be back soon."
We all eat. I figured I'd be more excited about these guys sitting together. Like how Carl used to get when superheroes in his comics met each other for the first time.
"So, you come from somewhere like here?" Ben asks me.
"Uh-huh," I sigh, cupping a mug of boiled water and letting the steam fill my nose. "Well, not the same. It's smaller. The walls are taller."
"We don't need tall walls when we have our fighters," Jenny smirks.
Mikey shrugs. "I considered climbing in."
"You wouldn't have made it five feet," she sneers, stabbing her knife into the fried egg on her plate.
"And you say that you guys fought the Saviors?" Ben asks over the other two as they posture.
I nod.
"And... won?"
"No," Mikey tells him. "That's why we're leaving."
"You're leaving?" Jenny looks at me.
"We can talk about it," I say.
"Rhys," Mikey hisses. "We need you. Maggie needs you. Carl needs you."
"Wait..." Ben interrupts, shaking his head. "You told me you lost Carl."
"I wasn't totally lying," I say. "We sort of left everything on a weird note."
"Rhys," Mikey whispers, nudging my arm.
"I told you," I say, frowning at my drink, "people need me here."
Mikey gets up, glaring at me. I can see harsh words on his tongue, but he bites it. "Where can I sleep?"
Jenny gets up. "I'll show you."
Mikey passes Jenny her crutch, and the two leave the small apartment. I dip my head and groan. Ben laughs at me.
"What?" I side-eye him.
"You should go back," he tells me.
"What?"
"I heard what Mikey said," he tells me. "That you look happier here."
I lean back in my chair, folding my arms and feeling guilty. "You guys need me here..."
Ben smirks. "Do we?"
"Fuck you," I laugh.
"I mean it," he says. "It sounds like the people back in Alandria need you more."
"It's Alexandria."
"Don't try and change the subject," Ben growls, kicking my shin under the table.
"Ow, asshat!" I scowl at him, rubbing my leg.
"Seriously," he tells me. "Stop me if I'm wrong, but I'm guessing you left that place because people needed you. You wanna stay here because you can relax. Am I getting close?"
"You suck," I tell him.
"But I'm right?"
"I guess."
Benjamin smiles a sad smile.
"How can we even go back?" I say. "I can't tell Ezekiel about Alexandria. I promised Morgan that I wouldn't."
"I've got an idea," he tells me, grabbing my wrist to check my watch. "It's almost curfew. Pack what you need, and I'll get the others. Meet us at the stables in an hour."
"Okay," I sigh. "But... I'll get Mikey."
"One hour," Ben says again.
I pass the infirmary where Morgan is still staying, my bag over my shoulder as I make my way to the apartment complex that Mikey will be staying in. I consider telling Morgan, wondering if he'd come back with us. But I get this feeling that he won't leave until he can convince Carol to come back. I'm tempted to say goodbye — to say thanks and admit that he was right about some things back in the library. But I don't. I don't because I know he'd get that annoying smug look on his face that says he knows he was right.
I actually find Mikey before I reach where he should be. He's sitting in the royal garden, under an apple tree, holding a brilliant green apple.
"Did you pick it?" I ask, sitting down beside him.
"No," he says. "It was on the floor."
"Mikey—" I start.
"I'm sorry," he jumps in.
"No," I say. "I'm sorry."
He nods his head a few times, looking down at his hands in his lap.
"There's something I want to tell you," I say.
"What?"
"Before Alexandria," I say slowly. "I want to tell you about before Alexandria."
Mikey's eyes go wide behind his glasses, probably because I never talk about that. "Why?"
"Because when I saw you through that door... I think you were the only person in the world I would have been happy to see. If it was Rosita, or Sasha, or Carl, Maggie, Glenn, any of them... I would have just — I don't know... melted."
"Melted?"
"Shut up."
He snickers but frowns. "I don't get it. Why?"
"Because they know me. Top to bottom. Inside out." I smile. "I was happy to see you because you're my friend... maybe the best one I have now. But I was also happy to see you because you didn't know the worst bits— like this place doesn't. You fitted in with this place, and I don't want you to be like that. Another fairy-tale."
Mikey's cheeks go a little red, but he laughs it off. "So what happened?"
I sigh, suddenly wishing for some of Jenny's booze.
"I was with a friend before I found the Prison we lived in."
Mikey nods. "Sean, right?"
"Yeah."
"What was he like?"
I think on it. "Kind of an asshole, actually. He was family, though."
"Sounds like my brothers," Mikey snickers.
"I met a real friend though," I tell him. "When I got to the Prison."
"The one that liked books?"
"She died," I tell him, nodding. "Carol burnt her to death trying to stop a sickness spreading... well, maybe she killed her first. I never asked. But, yeah."
Mikey's eyes squint as he puts things together. "That's why you hate Carol."
"It is—" I suddenly pause. I pause because it's sad to think about everything that came after.
"You don't have to tell me," Mikey says.
But I do.
I tell him all of it. From the Cavalcade to Terminus — how Sasha and Maggie saved me, how it took a long time to feel human again. I tell him all about Tyreese — how losing him made me ugly, but also how I found Sasha in that ugliness, how we managed to make it less ugly together. By the time I'm done saying names like Beth, and Bob, and Noah, Mikey is looking at the apple in his hand, still listening with care.
He lets out a sharp breath. "Frick."
I can't help laughing at him.
"What?"
"Nothing," I chuckle. "You just never swear."
"Huh?"
"Swear— cuss —whatever you want to call it. I've never heard you do it."
He shrugs.
I look at him. "When did you start wearing glasses?"
"Oh," he says, pulling the round specs from his face and looking at them. "They were my dad's."
Outside the stables, in the middle of the road, we spot two figures waiting with a saddled horse. I didn't have anything to pack besides food— a bunch of sandwiches stuffed into one of Henry's bright green school backpacks over my shoulders, Mikey Wazowski's face plastered on the front.
I reach them, and I recognise the horse to be Downy-Beardy. Jenny and Benjamin are waiting for us.
"Can you just give us a horse?" Mikey asks Benjamin.
Ben nods, saying. "It'll be fine. DB spooks easily, so they don't take him out on patrol anyway."
"That comforting," I grumble under my breath.
Jenny hugs me, and I hug her back. She passes me a bow, followed by the quiver she was wearing the other day filled with handmade arrows.
"I can't take this... your dad made it," I say.
She insists. "I've got like six. Your aims still sucks, so you'll need all the help you can get."
"Thanks, Jen."
Ben bear hugs me next, crushing every bone in my body. "I'll miss you, idiot."
I try very hard not to cry. Telling myself over that Benjamin is not actually my brother.
I punch his shoulder when he pulls away. "Tell Henry I said bye?"
"He probably won't notice you're gone," Ben shrugs.
"Asshole."
Mikey climbs onto the horse so gracefully that I pause.
"Do you know how to—?"
"I spent over a week at Hilltop," he tells me. "They've got a lot of horses."
Mikey offers an arm and hoists me up onto the horse behind him.
Then Benjamin reveals his mighty escape plan.
"I cleared you leaving with Ezekiel and Richard. Told them that you're going to see Carol," he tells us. "The guards on the gate will let you out."
Mikey nods. "Thank you."
The two step up onto the sidewalk, waving as we brace to leave.
But then I hear shouting.
I spot Mateo. He's running at full speed around the corner of a nearby guard post with his arms flailing for our attention. I duck behind Mikey.
"Go!" I hiss, wrapping my arms around Mikey's middle and bracing for take-off.
"But that guy's waving us down," Mikey says cluelessly. "You know him?"
"Rhys," Mateo gasps as he reaches us before I can yell at Mikey. He's completely out of breath but still managing to roll the R in my name the way he always does. "I searched for you at the palace... Benjamin told me you were leaving."
I peek up over Mikey's shoulder. "Hi, Teo..." I smile awkwardly.
"You weren't going to say goodbye, were you?"
I look down at the floor far below. "Sorry."
"I understand," Mateo smiles briskly. He then looks up at Mikey, standing a little straighter and asking. "So, is this the supposed man I lost your heart to?" He waves a hand disapprovingly.
I let go of Mikey's middle then, the both of us snorting at Mateo and making dismissive noises.
"Nah, man," I snicker. "This is Mikey."
"Mikey Monroe," Mikey introduce himself with a perky voice, extending a hand down to shake.
Mateo steps past his hand taking mine instead.
I laugh, my cheeks flushing.
"Rhys, I hope you find your true lover."
I smile, squeezing his hand. "Thanks, Mateo. Me, too."
He squeezes my leg and says goodbye before stepping back up onto the sidewalk. "Go now."
Mikey tugs on the reins, speaking to Downy-Beardy, and the horse takes us out the Kingdom gates, two guards closing them behind us.
I feel sad when the Kingdom melts from view on the road behind us. I go back to holding Mikey's middle.
"So, this Teo guy..." Mikey hums.
"You never speak of this," I groan, squeezing him — this feeling of home in my grip.
"But, Rhys," Mikey rolls his tongue at me. "Might I not tell your lover?"
"Definitely not him!"
"Maybe I should at least tell Carl he's got competition," Mikey suggests, clearly loving this. "I mean, that guy's voice was pretty sexy."
"Enough!" I squawk, melting on the back of the horse.
Mikey tells me we're going the wrong way when I point for him to ride down a different road to the one marked in red pen on his map.
"We're just going a different way," I tell him.
"Why?"
"One last loose end," I tell him, pointing when we get to the place I want to stop.
I ask Mikey to wait with the horse when we dismount outside a small cottage with sharp railed fences. I notice the small arrow that Morgan carved into the cottage's letterbox on our way to the Kingdom. The mailbox's flag has been flipped down.
The house's roof is dusted with dried leaves, and the wooden panel walls are a faded peach colour. The gates are chained, so I squeeze through a bend in the fence and walk up the trodden mud path to the front door. I try peaking in one of the windows, but the curtains are drawn so they've not got anything to show past their cracked paint jobs and rotted frames.
I knock on the front door three times.
Carol opens it.
She frowns — I didn't expect much else.
She looks past me to see Mikey standing at the gate. He waves. Carol doesn't.
"Rick found us?" she asks.
"No," I shake my head. "Just Mikey."
Carol looks shocked but smirks.
"You want to come in?" she asks me.
I can smell a fire coming from inside, and I'm pretty sure she's roasting pecans. There's a basket of fresh vegetables on a table that I can see over her shoulder.
"I'm good," I say.
Carol nods.
"I'm assuming you're not here to give me more food," she says.
"More?"
She points a thumb over her shoulder to the basket of veggies. "Ezekiel won't leave me alone."
I look over my shoulder at Mikey, who's fiddling with Downy-Beardy's saddle straps.
"So..." Carol hums, looking at Mikey too. She turns her head back to me. "What do you want?"
I consider telling her what Mikey told me. I decide I don't owe her that.
"I'm going home," I tell her, gesturing to Mikey. "Figured it's about time."
She just nods.
"I wanted to say..." I sigh, biting my tongue and swallowing something difficult because I do owe her this. "...thanks."
Carol stares at me like I just told her I'm dying or that I'm actually a walker in disguise that's been fooling everyone all this time. She looks almost worried.
"I've been thinking about Karen... a lot," I tell her. "Tyreese, too. Ever since we got to the Kingdom, actually. I keep thinking about how much they would have liked it. Reminds me of how she talked about Woodbury."
"Why are you thanking me?" Carol asks. She asks it like she needs to know — like it really matters to her.
"For letting me come with you. Even if you didn't want me to," I say. "I guess when two people divided by hostility are frightened, they come together in the most unexpected way."
Carol frowns. "What is that?"
"Just something from a book I read once."
Carol doesn't say 'you're welcome' or anything to that calibre. I'm grateful for that.
"Anyway," I shrug, turning on the spot, "see you."
Carol still doesn't say anything as I walk away. I hear the door shut.
A/N
Aight... I'm gonna explain the Karen thing because dammit I seeded it over a year ago, and I want people to know about it, aha. That quote Rhys told Carol is the last thing Karen ever said to Rhys, from the last book he brought her. The whole quote was-
"When two human beings divided by hostility are both, at the same time, mystified- no, frightened -by the same apparition, there is a bond that springs up between them, and they find themselves united in the most unexpected way. United in their humanity."
I've been sitting on bringing that quote back for a long time (102 chapters, to be exact). I think it sums up Carol and Rhys' relationship up to this point fairly well. They both hate how well they can work together, but that's how it is. I'm excited to see where they go next.
Thanks for reading :)
Next Time: Mid season finale!