I drag my feet over to a bench on the Barrington house porch where Carol is, and ask her to help tighten my elbow pads, which all the other people in the Kingdom seem to have no trouble with. She does it for me, and I stare at her after.
"What is it?" she asks softly, her silver hair wet with scattered drops of the morning rain.
"Are you going back to the Kingdom after this?" I ask.
She chuckles under her breath.
I frown at her. "What?"
"Henry asked me that, too."
"Same," I say.
"Are you?" She asks.
"No," I tell her plainly.
She nods, seeming to understand.
"Well?" I ask.
"I don't know," she says, standing up to sling a rifle over her shoulder. Carol's a pack mule of an arsenal. A gun and knife stuffed away between the padded armour pieces around her waist.
"Thinking about going back to your cottage?" I ask.
"No," she says quickly. "No, I think I'm done with that."
I nod a few too many times as she sits back down and starts loading bullets into a rifle magazine.
"Good," I say.
She squints at me, blocking the sun with a hand over her eyes.
"What did you say?"
I shrug. "It's good. That's good. I'm glad, I guess."
She leans back a little, like this is a trick to get her guard down so I can release a million Shivas on her.
"Can I ask why?" Carol murmurs.
I'm shrugging again, my shoulders getting a workout in this conversation.
"You shouldn't be — y'know — on your own."
"No," she says, sighing a little at the idea. "I don't think I should be."
Rosita and Daryl got back last night after Carl and I went to sleep. They didn't get Eugene, but they're back, and that's important. Now the two of them are down by the vegetable garden with Maggie, Jesus, Rick, and Michonne, where they're finalising the plan for ending the war today.
Rick, Maggie, and Ezekiel are taking what's left of our forces to where Negan is supposed to be, an old quarry marked with red a X on Dwight's map. Tara, Sasha, and Enid are staying behind with the turned Saviors to look after Judith and the other children. With so few soldiers for us to spare, if the Saviors hit Hilltop while everyone is gone, Sasha and Tara are supposed to lead everyone out the back into the woods to a rendezvous point.
I find Carl at the top of Barrington house, ignoring banging coming from one of the upstairs broom closets where Maggie has locked Gregory until we get back. Jesus pointed out the crow's nest the first time we got here. Apparently, you can see in every direction for miles on end. Despite all that, I've never actually been to the community's peak. I do get to the top now, climbing the ladder in the dusty attic and closing the trapdoor behind me, and when I reach it, I realise that Jesus was understating. Bounding green valleys and winding rivers that slip from the ends of forests into the bases of ridges infest the countryside with their magnificence. Their eleutheromania, pressingly evident in their untameable beauty.
Judith is on Carl's lap, playing with Gwendolyn, who has definitely seen better days, one of her blue ears missing.
"Ready to go?" I ask.
Carl picks up his hat from the floorboards, where it leaves a distinctive shape in the dust. He brushes a spiderweb from his hair and affixes the stetson to his head. "Ready."
Rick doesn't trust Dwight's map, so he takes a small group to check out one of the smaller roadblocks on the map. When they get back they tell us they found a second map on one of the Saviors. A second map with a second plan. Turns out it was a trap. The second map has a red X on the old mill road where it says Negan will be in the next hour, so that's where we're going.
We're cutting through one of those fields that Carl and I saw from the crow's nest. Except now that we're down here, boots on the ground, socks wet with grass dew, and surrounded by trees and open terrain, everything suddenly feels far more dangerous.
I'm walking with Rosita at the back of the militia's march. Carl's upfront near his dad and Maggie, chatting with Siddiq.
Rosita had found me last night and told me she was sorry about Mikey. Carl was there, and I could see he wanted to ask why — since Mikey's alive, and that should be good. But I thanked her with wet eyes because I knew that she understood it like the others didn't and still don't. Mikey being alive just means that he can die again. And I'm really not sure what happens then.
"Heard what happened yesterday," Rosita says, nudging my shoulder. Apologising when I lose my footing a little in the field's long, knotted grass.
I nod, huffing and puffing as we trek uphill. We didn't talk about the dive bar. When the ground finally starts to level out, I respond.
"I suppose a lot happened yesterday."
"It's good," she says. "You haven't lost that instinct of yours."
I think back on the days of escaping cannibals in the woods and asking her why she would trust someone like me with something as important as saving the world. I shake my head.
"I think I'm going to have to keep it in check," I say. "We both will, right? If things are going to change after this like the others want."
Rosita doesn't nod. Never one to do it if she doesn't agree all the way.
"Do you think Dwight knew he was giving us a fake plan?" I ask her.
I can hear Rosita sucking on her teeth. She goes quiet for long enough that if I didn't know her better, I might think she isn't going to respond.
"I think it might not matter if he didn't," she says finally. "Negan probably killed him if he really was on our side."
I raise an eyebrow at her.
She rolls her eyes.
"No," she says slowly. "No, I don't think Dwight betrayed us."
I smile at her, pursing my lips, satisfied. "Me neither."
She huffs at me, smirking just a fraction.
"You know," I say. "If we don't make it out of today. If I die, or you die, or we all die... I want you to know that you're my best friend."
Rosita glances at me with eyes that make me so unbelievably happy. They're wide, and completely shocked, and awed in a way Rosita isn't ever. She blinks the look away in an instant, and I snicker at her.
"What about Carl?" she asks after a moment of stunned silence.
"He has his own category," I say. "Doesn't count."
"Mikey?"
"Oh my god," I laugh, "just take the compliment."
"Sure," she nods. "Just, you know, you and Mikey—"
"Are you jealous?"
She scowls at me. "No."
"Then let's just move on. That's what I like about being friends with you."
I walk up ahead, going to ask Jerry for some water since he has the biggest canteen, but Rosita says something that makes me stop dead.
"You're mine, too."
I turn with a giant grin but drop it when I see Rosita, and everyone else behind her, staring off into the valley down the hill from us.
I look, too. At first, I don't see it. Just a forest followed by another forest followed by the horizon. But then the second forest isn't a forest. Maybe thousands of them are down there. Maybe more. When we all fall quiet to look, I can hear the faint sound of groans on the wind.
"Jesus," Maggie says breathily.
"Holy damn," Jerry gasps as we all gawk at the horde in the valley only a few miles away. "You ever seen one that big?"
"No," Rick murmurs. "Things are changing." He glances at Michonne and Carl, whose mouths are ajar at the sight of so many dead. "Let's go."
"How much further?" Daryl asks the King.
"We grow closer. Yonder, over the ridge."
I keep walking with the rest of them, unable to look away from the horde until I bump into Jesus ahead of me.
"Woah," he inhales, smoothly catching my shoulder when I trip. "You okay?"
"Yeah," I whisper, pretty sure he didn't hear me.
"It's scary," he tells me, keeping his eyes on the walkers as we trek, same as me. "This is why Carl, Michonne, and all the others that want to end this war with peace are right."
"How so?"
"That," Jesus points out over the ridge, "that's the end of the world. The Saviors are just what the end of the world turned people into. We can turn them back. We can."
I sigh. "We'll certainly need all the help we can get to fight a horde that big."
We weave through a small cluster of trees on the hillside that hides the horde from sight. I finally breathe again.
"Did Sasha talk to you before we left?" Jesus asks, rifle resting over his leather-clad shoulder.
"She said goodbye," I answer, a little confused about what the question is supposed to mean.
"I think it's good that she's staying back," Jesus tells me. "Sure, her being here would be good, too... for us. Her being back there is good for her."
Before I can respond, there's whistling on the wind.
Two notes.
The same two notes that burnt Alexandria.
Everyone jumps to a halt, weapons up and swinging in every direction. Almost a hundred men and women are shaking against their guns as we all search for the source. For the Saviors.
The field is empty. We're in a dip, hills on every side of us. The ridge ahead is loudest.
Then Negan is speaking to us, his voice booming like it had that night through some kind of speaker.
"WELL, DAMN, RICK... LOOK. AT. THAT. PEGGED AGAIN. PEGGED SO VERY HARD."
It was a trap.
A second trap.
Carl finds me in the crowd of soldiers, standing beside me with his gun up.
Morgan spears his staff into the earth to raise his rifle behind us.
Rick is spinning on the spot, looking for Negan.
But Negan's not here.
He's the wind around us.
And the wind's not done gloating.
"I AMBUSHED YOUR AMBUSH WITH AN EVEN BIGGER AMBUSH!"
"How about you step out and face us?!" Rick screams at the empty field.
Daryl's doing the same as me, cupping a hand over his eyes to search for the enemy.
"OH, I AM EVERYWHERE, RICK.
SOME MORE BULLHORNS, MORE WALKIES.
PICK A DIRECTION AND RUN.
SEE HOW YOU DO.
MAKE IT FUN FOR ALL OF US!
GUESS WHAT ELSE I DID...
I BROUGHT YOU SOME OF YOUR OLD FRIENDS. YOU REMEMBER YOUR OLD BUDDY EUGENE? WELL, HE IS THE PERSON THAT MADE TODAY POSSIBLE!"
I hear Rosita swearing in Spanish under her breath.
Beads of sweat are running down Carl's cheeks, and I realise that this could be it. This could be the day we die.
Negan booms on from the horizon.
"SAME GOES FOR DWIGHTY BOY HERE.
IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING, HE DIDN'T REAM YOU ON PURPOSE. NO, HE IS JUST A— A GUTLESS NOTHIN' THAT FUCKIN' SUCKS AT LIFE, AND NOW HE GETS TO STAND UP HERE AND WATCH YOU ALL DIE, AND HE'S GONNA LIVE WITH THAT.
GABRIEL AND MIKEY, WELL... THEY'VE GOT TO GO, TOO.
WE ARE CLEANING HOUSE TODAY, RICK."
"No," I whisper under my breath. Carl hears me and looks at me all worried and wide-eyed because there is nothing he can do to make this better.
"AND THEN... THERE'S YOU, RICK.
IT NEVER HAD TO BE A FIGHT. YOU JUST HAD TO ACCEPT HOW THINGS ARE.
SO...
HERE...
WE...
FUCKING...
FUCKITY...
MOTHER FUCKING...
GO!
CONGRATULATIONS, RICK."
We're all stone and dirt. Stuck still in the mud. No one's telling us what to do, so we just aim our guns hopelessly in every direction until...
"THREE..."
The countdown starts.
"TWO..."
The start of a new year.
"ONE!"
The end of a journey.
A line of Saviors on the ridge above us appears, their guns up and their bullets flying as they flash gunpowder and smoke in our direction. Only, they're the ones that fall. Their guns turn on them. Biting their hands and ears as every single one of them misfires and shoots at their owners before exploding in their hands.
Where there was whistling...
...there's so much screaming.
"NOW!" Rick roars.
Everyone is charging and shooting and yelling, and before all out war can start... it ends.
Almost all the Saviors surrender immediately.
Those that don't are fighting with knives and losing.
Michonne deflects someone's blade and slices their guts from their stomach.
I get to the top of the ridge with Carl and Rosita, looking for life between the Savior vehicles. We see Eugene, and Rosita puts a bullet in Regina's leg when she tries to kill him.
I hear Ezekiel yell that it's over.
We find Mikey and Gabriel bruised and tied up on the ridge. And after we free them Mikey tries to speak, but I'm grabbing him. Anywhere I can. Holding fistfuls of his hair and grabbing at the back of his neck as I pull his head into my shoulder and claw at his back in some terrible attempt at a hug. I think he gets it because he's doing the same.
When I pull away, I see him here with his watery brown eyes and his ruffled black hair and his stupidly over-excited face. His insanely alive features all exploding out at me. I'm tackling into him again, holding the sides off his neck and kissing both his cheeks and forehead, pressing my forehead into his and laughing as I brush my nose up against his.
Mikey laughs, his eyes red and swallowed by dark circles of purple.
"Did you just Eskimo kiss me?"
"SHUT UP."
I tuck my chin over his shoulder and hug him tighter.
It really does start to feel over then.
Carl hugs Mikey after me, and while that's happening, something in my brain switches to autopilot.
Maggie is beside me, gripping my shoulder.
I can see that we both get that chill down our spine when you realise something is gone. Only I don't think she ever shook that feeling.
We both have Negan on our faces. The thought of him and what he did burnt into our eyes and carved into our cheeks and steamed onto our breaths as we search for him.
We find him with Rick under a tree on the other side of the ridge. We stand in the crowd, pushing to the front to watch. Negan's on his knees, clutching a bleeding throat and staring up at a heaving Rick with a bloodstained piece of glass clenched between his fingers. A swinging pane of stained glass framed above them in the tree squeaks and catches in the gentle wind.
Negan's lips move quietly, and then he falls into the dirt, blood and dust seeping together as he turns pale beside his bat. That stupid fucking bat.
Everyone else is here watching now. Our people, the Saviors that surrendered, everyone looking as Rick walks away from the tree and towards us, the bloody stained glass slipping from his sliced-up fingers.
I hear Maggie finally start to breathe again.
Maybe for the first time since I left Alexandria and found the Kingdom.
I actually hear her breathe without him infesting her insides.
Rick points at Siddiq. "Save him."
Maggie's breathing catches in her throat like a fly in a trap.
"NO!"
Michonne holds her back as Siddiq runs to Negan with a first aid bag.
"NO, HE CAN'T! NO, HE KILLED GLENN."
"We have to," Rick tells her, not meeting her eyes as he looks towards Carl, who moved with Mikey to stand beside me.
"WE HAVE TO END IT!" Maggie screams.
"RICK!" She screeches.
I can't look at her either.
"WE HAVE TO MAKE IT RIGHT! IT'S NOT OVER!"
No one is holding me back, though.
Maggie's on her knees and held down by Michonne beside me, but no one's stopping me.
My gun is in my hand.
Negan's right there.
I could do it right now.
I could do it.
I could.
Carl's fingers twitch and brush against the back of my hand. He can see how tempting it is. He can see me shaking and crying and holding my gun in an iron grip, and all he says is...
"Do what you have to do."
I gasp.
I choke.
I wipe tears on my sleeve as they pour from me like blood.
And then I slowly holster my gun and turn away.
Rick gave a speech after the war was won.
The Saviors went home. We all did. Rick forgave the Saviors and ordered the collapse of what Negan had built.
Peace and fairness came next.
Common ground.
The world became ours by right.
Life against death.
Every one of us left against the horde we saw.
Because it's coming for us.
It is.
But not today.
Not tomorrow.
Maybe not for a while.
After the end of something that's gone on for a long time, it's hard to remember what you're meant to be. What you were before... how much of that is meant to be the same after. At least, that's how I felt.
I went back to Hilltop for a while. Maggie needed me there, and I needed her. It's hard to heal without family, and that's what we were. We would sit by Glenn's grave some days. On other days we might just pass by it. Eventually, as the grass climbed over to rest and the dirt sprung delicate, yellow daisies, it became beautiful. I asked Maggie once if she thought maybe Glenn grew those flowers for us. To remind us. She smiled, and although I knew she didn't think that, I think she liked the idea.
The Saviors we had prisoner at Hilltop went back to help build Sanctuary into something different. Alden stayed. He told us he wanted to help build some of the things in the key to a future book. It wasn't just the Saviors that went. Dwight and Morgan disappeared, too. Morgan gave me Benjamin's old armour before he vanished on the day we won. Asked me to give it to Henry.
Other people turned up, though. Jadis, whose real name is apparently Anne. Oceanside showed up to help right at the end, Tara said they saved Hilltop from a group of Saviors that tried to take it while we were away fighting. Eugene even came back to us after sabotaging all the Saviors' guns to save us. I guess everything evens out eventually.
I ended up staying at the Kingdom a lot longer than I thought I would when I took Henry his brother's armour. It was always either Jenny's cooking, Henry's homework, DnD with Jerry and the King, or helping Carol and Nabila in the royal gardens that kept me there just that one more day. But eventually, I had to leave that, too.
I wasn't alone, though.
No.
I think that would be silly after everything we lost.
Today is a whole month after the end of the war. And Sasha and I are riding our way to Alexandria after a pitstop at Hilltop. Carl and Mikey are here with us. We picked up Mikey from Hilltop, where Enid and him have spent most of their time together. I asked Enid to come back with us, but since Dana died in the war, leaving Siddiq as the only doctor in all three communities, Enid decided that she wanted to help him out. Carl's been with us the whole time. Or at least most of it. I guess this was that boring we talked about. Sure, we kill the dead and hunt for food still, but it feels normal and better now. Carl went back to Alexandria for a few days or so to help start building it back up, but after I didn't go to visit, he came to me instead.
His horse got sick the other night, so he had to leave her in Hilltop and share a saddle with me on Downy-Beardy.
With his arms loose around my waist, I ask Carl something over my shoulder that keeps bouncing against his chest.
"Are you looking forward to going back?"
Carl's laugh tickles the hairs on the back of my neck. "Obviously, man. I'm sick of only talking to Jude on the radio."
I chuckle, looking over to Sasha on the far side of the road, Mikey riding between us.
"How about you two?" I ask. "Looking forward to getting to Alexandria?"
Sasha opens her mouth, but Mikey speaks up first, sounding excited.
"I mean, I was only there a week ago, but yeah," Mikey says all in one breath, grinning after.
I nod, and Mikey goes on.
"I wonder where I'll be sleeping now," he hums to himself.
"Erm, in your house?" I laugh.
"Oh, didn't I tell you?" Mikey winces at me. "I gave my old house to Rick and Michonne."
"What?" I frown. "Why?"
Mikey bunches his shoulders up to his ears and then drops them. "You know who is locked up in that cell Morgan built... which is right under my house. I don't really want to live over him, and it makes sense that Rick's close by in case something happens."
"So what you're saying," Carl buzzes, "is that I've gotten a house upgrade? Sweet."
"You'd think that," Mikey sighs. "But all those stairs get super exhausting."
Downy-Beardy whinnies at us when I pull his head away from a blackberry bush we pass by.
"What about you, Sash?" Mikey asks.
She nods, her whole body bobbing up and with her horse, Dusty. "It'll be good," she says firmly. "Good to see everyone."
Michonne meets us at the gate— or what used to be the gate before it was knocked down and is now replaced with a stand-in metal fence —she attacks Carl the second he's off the horse with tight hugs and pinched cheeks, which makes the rest of us laugh as he barks in protest and tries fruitlessly to escape her clutches.
I slip off Downy and start leading him and Dusty off to the stables while Michonne is distracted with Mikey and Sasha. Making sure to get out of there before any other people start to show up.
As I lead the horses down Morgan street, I listen to the slow clips and clops of their hooves against the road while I look around at the new and improving Alexandria. Houses are still burnt, but new ones are being built. Piles of timber lie to the side of the new solar panels that Carl told me Tara and Eugene found in the same warehouse where we got the parts to fix the old ones.
I get the horses settled with fresh hay and water before I go in the direction of 101 with my bag of very few things.
I run into Rick on the way.
"Rhys!" He grins like I've never seen him grin. In fact, I don't think I have ever seen him grin. I decide it's unsettling.
Usually, it's just a tired smile.
Maybe he really is happier since the war ended, huh?
Maybe... I just always thought that he was the type that doesn't get happier.
That's morbid.
I know, but—
"Rhys?" Rick asks, gripping my shoulders and gently shaking me from my own head. "You okay, son?"
I've been doing this a lot lately. Getting lost in my head. Talking to the voices that live in there.
"Yeah," I say, smiling. "Hey, Rick."
Rick hugs me tight, and I feel like I could cry because I'm feeling guilty about how long it's been.
You had a good reason.
"I heard you got back... just on my way to the gate," Rick says. "Thought I'd find you there."
"Figured the horses could do with not being crowded."
He raises an eyebrow. "The horses or you?"
I shuffle my feet a little.
"What took you so long to come home?" Rick asks the very question I've been dreading the whole ride over.
"I don't know," I say, shrugging at the question and brushing it off. "Guess everything's just been busy at Hilltop, and the Kingdom was too..." I trail off.
You've been doing that a lot lately, too.
Shut up.
Rick just nods and smiles at me again.
He's doing it too much now.
"Good to have you home," he says. "We've got you and Sasha all set up in the guest rooms. I know you and Carl are gonna make a fuss about being in separate rooms, but—"
"Oh, erm, Rick," I cut him off, holding up my rucksack between us like a shield, "I was thinking I'd stay somewhere else..."
"Oh..." Rick's eyes go a little wide, but he nods. "Well, we gave yours and Maggie's old house to Aaron. He didn't want to be where he was. What with all the things remindin' him of Eric. And with Gracie, he could do with a bigger house, so we gave him 99."
"That's fine," I smile. "I kinda don't want to go back there for similar reasons, I guess."
Rick nods, scratching a short grey beard that he seems to be growing out.
"Well," he sighs, "101 is still under construction after the windows got broken and walkers ran through it."
"Where's Rosita staying?" I ask. "I'll just bunk with her."
"It'll probably be a squeeze... since she's moved into one of the apartments on her own."
"That's fine. I'll take her couch."
Rick looks disappointed, and I avoid his eyes until he answers me.
"She's just way down by Aaron's old house. Opposite Minnie and Barbara. I can show you."
"Thanks, I'll find it," I smile at him. "See you around?"
"Rhys," Rick puts a hand on my shoulder before I walk away, holding me there, "I get why you don't want to stay with us. Same reason neither you nor Maggie have been back here since the war ended."
I fiddle with the straps of my backpack, taking the time to unbuckle it and buckle it twice.
"Will you at least come for supper tonight?"
I take a short walk off a tall cliff in my head before nodding.
"Thank you."
I do go for supper, and it's fine once I get inside.
But before then...
Those cellar steps...
The way they descend into darkness...
Darkness that reaches out with sickening, black tendrils...
An awful that pours down the window bars and up the stone steps.
Every inch of the Brownstone cell.
He's calling out to me as I pass.
Saying my name with that same gravel and sand in his voice. Only it's also a croaked whisper from where the glass slit his jugular.
"Rhysie... won't you come down and see me?"
I don't speak as I walk up the steps to the Brownstones.
"Oh, come on, don't ignore me. I didn't bash in your step-whateverthefucks brains out so you would play me the cold shoulder card."
I place my hand on the doorknob and twist.
"Oh well, I'll be here when you come back—"
I walk inside.
"And you will come back. Oh, we'll have so much to talk about then."
A/N
And there's the end of season 8! I can't lie... I'm very excited for S9.
I kind of went more light-hearted on this season, if you can believe that. There were plans at one point to kill Mikey, Carl, and Sasha; have Rhys go down a much darker path, but I figured that eventually, that would just get depressing to read and write. Maybe I'll write an AU of it one day, who knows.
I'm so in love with Rhys giving Mikey a kunik. It's just such a wholesome and beautiful way to show love in my mind. GAHHH.
Also, Minnie and Barbara have moved in together because I think it's sweet, and Barbara needs some happiness to repay always babysitting so the boys could have fun.