-Mikey-
Every day was different.
Some days were busy.
Some busier...
Some, not busy at all.
Today was not one of those latter days.
Between investigating the graffiti that Daryl was now scrubbing off his front door and listening to Aaron's complaints about Rhys interrupting his training, Mikey barely had time to acknowledge Rosita telling him that Marco was on the long-range for him.
He scraped the chair back on the concrete floor of Gabriel's office-slash-garage, plonking himself down and pressing the button in.
"Hello?"
"Mikey?"
"Affirmative..."
"Oof, you sound tired."
"How long has it been since we spoke?"
"A few days, why?"
"It's been longer since I slept."
"You're kidding. I thought the walker waves stopped a few days ago?"
"Besides a three-hour power nap last night, no, I am certainly not kidding. The walkers stopping doesn't mean Alexandria's taken a break from being a pain in my butt."
"The rest of the council aren't helping?"
"Michonne and Carl left for Hilltop this morning with Rhys, so Aaron's taking over security. That leaves me in charge of rotas and rationing until we're out of siege mode."
"I'm sorry."
"Not your fault," Mikey chuckled. "How's Hilltop holding up?"
"Well, with Sasha back, she's taken over the relief efforts... we've now got everyone out of the building that the tree took out. Mostly Kingdom folk."
"Does Sasha think it's whisperers?"
"If a damn tree branch fell in the woods right now, Sasha would think it was the whisperers."
"But?"
"But she'd probably be right."
"How come you're not out there helping?"
"Oh, Yumiko asked me to brief Alexandria. Rosita's already taken down the report, though, so you can go get some rest, yeah?"
"Don't know about that, but thanks for the concern."
"I miss you, Mikey."
"You do?"
"God, for someone that could teach an old-world lecture in Latin, you're so clueless sometimes."
Mikey hummed until a smile was mustered from his tired face. "I miss you, too."
Mikey skipped most of lunch on account of more 'silence the whisperers' graffiti popping up on Morgan Street and even the newer housing projects along Alexandria's farming plots. With the amount that was appearing, they either had someone truly passionate about the message on their hands, or a group of people that felt the same way. Honestly, Mikey wasn't sure which was worse.
By the time Mikey made it to the town hall for his lunch, most people had eaten and left. The few still sitting were those either bogged in paperwork like him or those who had just gotten off patrol.
Mikey said hello to Gage when he waved over at him from the far end of the hall. He also smiled politely at Margo and Alfred, who were sitting with Gage.
"There he is," Nora chuckled as Mikey sat down beside her after getting his bowl of soup from the stewpot still bubbling over the fire at the back of the room. Aaron and Dante were sat with her.
Aaron reached across the table to snatch Mikey's slice of bread and tear it in half with his teeth, tossing him back a piece.
"Hey!" Mikey complained, reaching for it but to no avail when Aaron held it away and out of reach.
"Blame Rosita," Aaron argued. "She stole mine."
Mikey shot an irritated glare across to the small table Rosita was eating at with Gabriel and Coco.
She grinned and stuck her tongue out at him.
Gabriel smiled, mouth too full to put his salutations into words.
"How was Marco?" Aaron asked, already shamelessly digging into the stolen bread.
"Huh," Mikey sighed. "I don't think I actually asked..."
"Good lord," Nora mumbled into her bowl.
"I know," Mikey grumbled. "I'll ask next time I hear from him."
"C'mon," Dante sang at Mikey with a mischievous smile that spread from ear to ear. "I mean, a fish as good-lookin' as you can afford to be a little hard to catch... but you gotta give him a little somethin'."
Mikey looked caught somewhere between frazzled and perplexed. "I'm going to look past you calling me a fish..."
"A good-lookin' fish," Nora added with a baffled expression.
Gabriel, who was clearly eavesdropping from his neighbouring table, dabbed at his mouth with the white tablecloth tucked behind his collar before speaking softly across the tables. "To be fair, you have been rather busy lately, not to mention—"
They turned at the sound of a loud thud. Lydia had managed to glide through the room unnoticed and drop herself and something wrapped in brown paper at Gage's table.
"Give us some room, please?" Gage groaned at her.
Instead, Lydia yanked her knife out, unwrapping the paper to reveal a dead squirrel belly up on the table. She stabbed into it, slicing open its gut.
Blood squirted across Gage's face.
He gagged, stumbling out of his seat away from her. "Oh my god, what is wrong with you?!"
Margo and Alfred were staring daggers at her. Everyone was watching. The whole room was quiet apart from Gage's sounds of disgust.
"You're crazy!" Gage yelled at her.
"Is this why Ozzie and Alek died?" Alfred hissed at Margo. "So she could make a fool out of us?"
She shook her head, whispering something to him under her breath.
Lydia dipped one of her fingers inside the squirrel, swirling it around before clawing out its intestines and dropping them on the table. She pressed the bloody finger to her lips and smiled at Margo, shushing her.
The three stormed out.
Aaron was glaring, fist balled up on the table.
Mikey jumped up before anyone else could. The second Lydia saw him, she rolled her eyes, got up and left as swiftly as she had entered.
"I'll speak with her," Mikey told the rest of them.
"Not gonna finish your—" Dante started.
"All yours!"
Mikey found Lydia in the small, cobbled nook under the steps to her and Daryl's apartment where they stored spare logs and gardening tools. She was storing the squirrel she'd gutted, cleaning her knife before replacing it on her belt.
Mikey stood in the entryway, blocking her exit.
"So that happened," he chuckled uncomfortably.
Lydia glared at him like a hawk— an angry, caged up hawk. She wiped the blood off her hands and onto her pants. "Look, I get it... Rhys asked you to look after me while he's gone. Well, I can save us both the hassle. I don't need looking after."
Mikey snorted at her in an impressed sort of way. "Clearly. But if you really do want to live in Alexandria, then—"
"They deserved it."
"They did."
She grimaced. "After everything they said at training this morning and what Rhys did... why am I the one getting yelled at?"
"I'm not yelling at you."
"No, you're doing that stupid thing you people do," she hissed. "Acting like somethin's fine when you're angry."
"I'm not angry, either..." Mikey smiled at her, trying to apologise with his eyes. "Look, if you want me to force Aaron to make Margo and her crew run training drills until they drop, I'll talk to him about it. But don't you think that will just make them angrier with you?"
Lydia groaned. "And what about Rhys? He didn't get into trouble for messing with them."
Mikey snorted. "Rhys is Hilltop royalty. Giving him a slap on the wrist for it isn't worth the hassle."
"That's stupid."
"No one agrees with you more than him," Mikey sighed at her like he found the whole thing exhausting. "He hates it. But if Yumiko or, god forbid, Sasha found out we gave him a night in lock-up or poop duty in the stables, it could start a pointless argument the communities don't need. Besides, Rhys normally volunteers for that job anyway."
"You people with your pointless rules and your games," Lydia sighed, standing up and walking over to him, looking like she wanted to pass him.
"Some of them are pointless," Mikey admitted. "But they make people feel safe."
She didn't look convinced.
"Why'd you do the whole squirrel thing, anyway?"
"Rhys told me to be myself."
"He told you to spray squirrel blood on Gage?"
"No, but—"
"It's done," Mikey cut her off gently. "And for the record, Rhys didn't get in trouble because he's learned how to play those games by the same rules that you don't like. He didn't do anything against the rules. Maybe try it?"
Lydia thought about that, so Mikey quickly chimed back in.
"Only, no more rabbit guts, yeah?"
She slumped her shoulders a little. "Fine."
"Yeah?" Mikey's eyebrows shot down as he looked unsure.
She nodded. "We have to evolve. Animals have rules. People have rules. I guess we have to change if we want to survive."
"Do you want me to talk to Gage and the others?"
"No," she said. "I don't need you to fight my battles for me."
"Alexandria to Hilltop. Come in Hilltop."
Mikey waited for the radio to respond. He found himself staring out the window of Rosita and Gabriel's garage, focusing on how the moonlight bounced off the rooftops of the houses across the street.
He sighed. "Alexandria to Hilltop, this is Mikey Monroe. Come in Hilltop."
"Everything okay?"
Mikey turned, not to the sound of the radio, but instead Rosita stood in the doorway. A thin, dark, wool shawl was cloaked around her skinny shoulders.
Mikey looked at her, discouraged, a little worry in his eyes. "Still nothing from Hilltop."
Rosita plodded down the two concrete steps into the garage, standing on the other side of the radio table. "Could be something went bad with the wall?"
"Maybe we send people..."
"We already have," Rosita reminded him.
"Fudge," Mikey hissed.
Rosita chuckled at him and his inability to cuss. Then she bit her lip, frowning at herself.
"Eugene's only going because of me," she said quietly.
"I thought he was going to help them fix the wall and the radio?"
She shook her head, looking a little dazed. "I told him we would never be a thing."
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"That's..."
"Yeah, it is."
"Like really..."
"Yes, Mikey," she breathed. "It's a lot."
"Did he take it well?"
"He got on that wagon, didn't he?"
Mikey nodded, twisting his face at the problem. "That's difficult."
"As is life, my friend," she chuckled, fiddling with a wire on the back of the radio set up that looked loose. "I need to know things are good between me and him. I messed it up with my last best friend. Really don't wanna do it twice."
"Rhys?"
She smirked at the table, fiddling with her hands. "Is it dumb that my best friend in the whole world was a seventeen-year-old boy?"
Mikey gave it some thought. "Is it weird that the dead rose and now roam the earth?"
She pursed her lips, slowly nodding. "Good point."
"You fixed that, though," Mikey reminded her. "He is Coco's padrino after all."
"You know what I mean," she sighed. "I don't want to make that first mistake with Eugene if I can hel—"
The was a scream.
They looked at each other.
They ran for the door.
"You freak, this is your fault!"
"It was Negan! Negan killed her!"
Rosita and Mikey arrived just in time to see the aftermath. A crowd had gathered behind the homes by the lake where washing was hung to dry. They had to push their way through to where Aaron and Gabriel were. They saw Lydia curled up on the floor with Daryl cradling her head. Negan was stood off to the side in cuffs, staring at his feet. Margo's body was slumped against the wall of a house with blood running down it behind her head. Gage and Alfred stood off to another side under guard as well, both looking terrified.
Lydia was crying and begging into the night.
"No, he didn't do anything wrong! No, it wasn't... he didn't do anything!"
"Get him out of here!" Daryl barked.
Mikey moved aside as Brandon escorted a very quiet Negan back to his cell.
"No! HE DIDN'T DO ANYTHING WRONG!" Lydia wailed.
"I know, I know," Daryl cooed in a much softer voice, pulling her up to sit and holding her close to his chest.
Mikey saw Siddiq by Margo's body. His head was whipping back and forth between people in the crowd, his chest heaving as he panted.
Mikey rushed over to him.
"Siddiq, are you—?"
But he was shoved out of the way, and Siddiq ran towards Main Street.
Mikey looked at Rosita, but she watched him leave just as confused.
Gabriel's voice broke through the crowd's jeers and protests.
"Take Lydia to the infirmary. Escort Alfred and Gage to the town hall. As for the rest of you, go back to your homes. The council will deal with this."
Once everyone was gone, Gabriel glanced at Mikey, who was itching to follow Daryl and Lydia to the infirmary.
"I can hold off the meeting for an hour," he said quietly.
"Thank you."
"One hour."
When Mikey entered through the infirmary door's back door, Dante was already set up with a gurney in the corner of the room, working a bandage around Lydia's wrist before tucking a rolled-up towel under her armpit. She winced.
Daryl was standing beside her, and when Dante walked away, Mikey hovered by the door to listen.
"I'm so sorry this happened to you..."
She didn't speak. Her knee was tucked up to her chin. Her whole body shook.
"Lydia?"
"He was so sweaty," she mumbled, her voice trembling. "Never liked deodorant... said it made his armpits itchy. So, I got used to it. Sometimes he smelled like garlic and onions. I miss him."
"Who's that?" Daryl asked so gently Mikey almost didn't hear him.
"My dad," she cried softly. "My dad would've protected me."
Daryl sat on the gurney beside her. "Tell me what happened."
"Negan saved my life."
Mikey sat with Lydia for a while so Daryl could go question Negan. When it had been long enough, he headed toward the Brownstones.
As he wandered down the street and checked his watch nervously, Mikey spotted Carol sitting on the steps outside Daryl and Lydia's home. Daryl was actually with her. She said something about New Mexico before Mikey could clear his throat and interrupt.
"You guys okay?"
Carol nodded — Daryl shrugged.
"How's Lydia?" he asked.
Mikey shook his head. "Everything her mother made her think about places like this... we're just making it worse."
"We'll make it better," Daryl assured him.
Daryl stood then, walking past him and patting his shoulder before telling him he needed to speak with Michonne and Carl on the radio so they would know what was happening.
Mikey watched and Carol watched him walk down the street and disappear around the corner. Mikey gave her a tight smile before walking past, but she stopped him with a sharp whistle.
Turning to look at her, Mikey frowned.
"What?" she smirked.
"I don't like whistling."
She frowned at him like a mother would when you don't get a place on your high school football team. As if to say— "To bad, sunshine."
Her face got more serious and dark then.
"This is a waste of time," Carol said in a whispery voice.
"Looking into a death?" Mikey asked.
"Focusing on Negan," she corrected him. "I mean, what happened is obvious... Gage and his friends tried to mess with her, Negan stepped in, Margo died. Did he mean to do it? Probably not. Maybe, but probably not. We should be focusing on Alpha."
Mikey nodded. "We're trying."
"We could be trying harder."
The basement below his old home was draughty at best. The stained, pale bricks that made its walls weren't so good at keeping the warm in. Their job was something different.
Negan was lying face-up on his cot when Mikey walked in.
"How's she doing?" he asked quietly, a hand covering his eyes like he knew how much shit he'd gotten himself into.
"Cuts and bruises," Mikey said, matching Negan's faint, whispery voice. "Coulda been a lot worse."
Negan grumbled into his hand before slumping it lazily across his chest.
"Was it an accident?" Mikey asked.
"Sure was."
Negan had a way of making the believable sound far-fetched.
"And for the record," Negan sighed, sitting up to look at Mikey through the bars. "Screw her. She was a goddamn asshole beatin' on a kid. World's better off."
"No one deserves that," Mikey said. "Not too long ago, a whole bunch of people thought you deserved the same."
"Oh, but Mikey-boy, it was a long time ago, and people still want my nuts in a noose. People don't forget."
"But they change," Mikey argued.
"Think I've changed?"
"You helped Lydia," Mikey answered tactically.
Negan scoffed. "I'm a sucker. See, I started believing in your way of life. Your moral code. Hell, you even gave me a little taste of freedom just so you could yank it away when I actually did the right thing. You gotta admit, that is pretty fucked up. And we both know I appreciate some fucked up shit."
Mikey tutted at him, realising he didn't believe half of what Negan just said.
"And back then," Negan groaned. "Things evolved."
"Sure," Mikey admitted, remembering what Lydia said earlier that day. "We were on opposite sides of these bars, for instance."
"And look what happened."
Mikey smirked. "I knocked you to the floor and Sasha almost took your eye out."
"People change, kid..." Negan shook his head. "But people don't forget."
When he came back up the those cellar steps, Carol was still sat in the same place, rolling a smoke between her fingers and staring at the orange tip burning its way to her.
"Coming?" Mikey called.
She shook her head, still watching the smoke. "Think I'm okay."
The meeting hall was lit by fewer lanterns than night-time meetings had been in the past. It was like they knew what they were here to talk about, and they were ashamed of it.
When Mikey walked in, the council reared their collective head.
"Where have you been?" Aaron asked, a deep scowl under his beard.
"Getting the other side of the story," Mikey told him as he took his seat at the council table. Now, the only chairs left empty were Michonne and Carl's.
"And?" Gabriel asked, leaning forward to look at Mikey past Aaron on his right.
"Negan denies that it was on purpose," Mikey told them all. "Lydia backs that up."
Aaron scoffed, leaning back and folding his arm over his metal one. "The word of a killer and the word of a whisperer."
"Only she's not," Nora argued.
"Doesn't change what Negan is," Kyle grumbled.
"I get why people think Negan's been redeemed," Aaron said, suddenly trying a softer, more diplomatic tone. "I've... I've wondered it myself. Hell, maybe he has changed. But, a man like that... who's done the things he's done. Killed the people he's killed. Something inside him is broken."
Mikey watched Daryl walk in, quietly standing in an unlit corner and watching the debate.
That's the problem meetings held in the dark— you can't see when the secrets get out.
Aaron stared at Mikey. "We need to face that fact."
Siddiq looked unsure. "Yes, but killing him now over this undermines the civilisation we have built."
"What about the people who never got to witness that civilisation because of him?" Aaron hissed. "He gutted Mikey's brother in the streets, for Christ's sake!"
"What the hell are you even talking about?" Siddiq groaned. "The Whisperers are attacking us!"
"Okay, let's take a break," Gabriel sighed.
"No, let me finish!" Siddiq barked, his chair scraping against the floor as he jumped up. "Look at what's going on at Hilltop. We're taking our eyes off the ball."
Gabriel held up a hand for silence. "The council wasn't made for this... deciding on a man's life in the dead of night because people are carrying pitchforks and torches."
"Siddiq isn't wrong," Mikey butted in. "The Whisperers are out there still. Attacking Hilltop... sending walkers at us..."
"We don't know if either of those things were them," Gabriel said.
"Come on," Mikey groaned. "We all know it was them. I've spent the last year pouring over enough books on medieval warfare to improve Alexandria's defences to fill a library. Wars of attrition? Crippling our walls? —That's page one."
"Hey, look," Daryl chimed in, stepping into the dim light cast by one of the lanterns. "If you can't make a decision, the people out there are gonna make one for you."
"Did you speak with Michonne and Carl?" Gabriel asked him.
"Carl's a hard no," Daryl said, to no one's surprise. "And Michonne wants me to be her vote. Lydia said Negan saved her... so he saved her. I'm a no, too."
"Where does that put us?" Mikey asked.
"I'm a yes," Kyle said. "Negan's a thorn we can't afford to have in our side right now."
"Agreed," Laura said, nodding at him.
"And me," Aaron said.
"I'm a no," Siddiq spoke to the room quickly.
"So am I," Nora said. "Killing a man over this, when we don't have all the facts... doesn't sit right."
Aaron stared at Mikey until he spoke. Mikey was watching Gabriel's unsure face intently.
"I say yes," Mikey told them.
Siddiq laughed disbelievingly. "You can't be serious?"
"Really?" Nora hissed.
"That puts us at a tie," Laura grumbled. "Gabriel, where's your vote?"
Gabriel's chair dragged against the floorboards as he stood. "I'm going to take the night to clear my head and consider my vote, and I suggest you all do the same."
Laura and Kyle scoffed.
Aaron grimaced but nodded, standing up and turning to Mikey. "Home?"
Mikey bobbed his head. "Yeah."