#the walk of spirits | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

topazy · 20 days ago

Text

Teen spirit

Pairing: Carl Grimes x reader

Warnings: Swearing, mentions of blood

Chapter: 6.07

You silently prayed, holding onto the silver cross Carl gave you while Maggie slept in the bed in the RV. She was in so much pain, and eventually exhaustion had taken over her. The thought of losing her terrified you.

Rick crouches down beside you and gently squeezes your shoulder. “Do you remember the night at the prison when the gate fell down and the walkers got through; it was at the same time everyone was sick with the flu?”

You wipe at your eyes, which now feel sticky with tears. “Yeah?”

“Me, you, and Carl stopped the horde from getting to the people we love.”

“I don’t understand,” you admit.

“You needed to be brave that night, just as you have so many other times. When you shot Ron... Maggie needs you to be brave now.”

“I’m scared I’m going to lose her.”

“I know, but the doctor in Hilltop will take good care of her.” Rick lowers his voice. “It’s not just your sister that needs you; Carl does as well. He’s trying to be strong, but everything that’s happened since we arrived in Alexandria... I know he’s struggling.”

You turn your head and nod, “Okay.”

Rick kisses your forehead and goes to join Sasha, Abraham, Eugene, Aaron, and Carl at the front of the RV, but just as he does, the campervan comes to a sudden halt.

“What’s going on?”

“Enemy close,” Abraham says calmly.

You stand up to look out of the front window to see a group of men with guns standing around a man who is laying on the road who looks as if he’s had a bad beating.

Rick goes to open the door, but pauses and hands you a gun first. “YN, stay here with Maggie. The rest of you are with me.”

You crouch down, trying to keep out of view while watching. It’s hard for you to hear everything that’s being said, but Rick and the other man in charge have a standoff, but surprisingly no bullets are fired.

—

Carl tilts the blinds to look out of the window, watching as Walker stumbles through the field next to the road. He closes the blinds and looks at Aaron, “Why didn’t you stay back and defend the place?”

You were sitting further up the RV at a small table with Eugene trying to help him look for another route to Hilltop from your current position, but you still had a view of the bed your sister was in, including those sitting next to her.

“I owe her,” Aaron answers, looking at Maggie. “Why did you come?”

“I owe them, plus I need to keep Y/N safe.”

You start to grow nervous when Eugene stops mumbling to himself; you’re afraid there is no other route, and the only other options are to return home and hope for the best, or fight with the men from the saviors and hope for the best. But Eugene finally breaks his silence. “I think I’ve got something.”

—

“Do you think you could do it?” Abraham asks as he drives the RV along the new route. It was only the two of you sitting up the front, so you weren’t sure where the conversation was coming from since you’d been sitting in silence.

“Do what?”

“Do what Maggie and Glenn did with Carl?”

You laugh at his words, “I’m too young to think about marriage and babies.”

“I may have agreed with you at one point, but now in this new world?” He sees the expression on your face and chuckles to himself, “I’m not saying you get Gabriel to perform a ceremony the moment we go home, but if what you have is special, then never let it go. No matter how old you are.”

You knew Abraham was just trying to distract you from being upset, but you did appreciate it. “The last thing anybody needs is a drunk behind the wheel.”

“You always had a smart mouth on ya, I was starting to miss hearing your shit talk.”

Growing up the way you did, your mother and father always drilled it into you to be polite, respectful, and never swear, and even during the apocalypse, you were afraid something bad would happen if you did. “My daddy would have said you were a bad influence.”

“That’s funny because Glenn said the exact same thing to me last week.” He clears his throat. “Tell you what? Once this is all done and dusted, I’ll teach you how to drive properly so the next time I’m drunk driving, you can take over.”

“Deal.”

A few more moments of silence pass until Abraham turns the corner and you see another group of men with guns blocking the road, “bitch nuts. Y/N, don’t get too close to the window.”

Everyone gathers to stare at the men; you gulp down. If they decided to attack now, it wouldn’t take long for all of you to be dead. Unless Abraham managed to speed away, then our group would easily be overpowered.

“Do we make a stand?” Sasha asks.

“Yeah,” Carl looks at his dad. “We end it.”

“No, we can’t. This is a trap; the moment we step out of the RV, we are dead.”

“With one of us behind a wheel that’s five on sixteen,” Rick adds. “We’re gonna play it our way, how we want.”

Abraham slowly backs the RV up, and when he doesn't, one of the men starts firing into the sky, causing you to flinch, feeling as scared as you did when the men ambushed you, Daryl, Rosita, and Denise.

You start to feel yourself panic, but a hand reaches out and holds onto your wrist. Carl keeps hold of you until you’re far enough away that the gunshots start to fade into the distance.

—

“Wait, dad, something's not right.”

The saviors were now toying with your group and had set traps up blocking the different roads. They had a row of walkers chained together blocking the road, but it wasn’t until now that you noticed what Carl was so freaked out about.

“Oh my god, that’s Daryl’s.”

One of the walkers had a piece of Michonne attached to the side of its head; the others had clothing that belonged to other members of your group.

Rick goes to stab one of the walkers in the head, but men appear on either side of the road and begin firing at you.

“Everyone into the RV now!”

Carl and Sasha cover Rick while he breaks the blockade of walkers by cutting off their arms, making space for Abraham to drive through. Once you make it back onto the RV, you immediately go to Maggie’s side and notice how much worse she looks.

—

You place your hand on Maggie’s forehead. “She’s burning up.”

“She’s going to make it,” Carl says, trying to reassure you.

“The Saviors are messing with us for fun. They’ve made sure we know they have our people; they aren’t afraid of walkers, but yet they aren’t killing us.” Each time Abraham drove so far up another road, there would be another blockage preventing you from going any further. They even hung a man and set fire to one of the blockades in front of you. “These people aren’t scared of anything.”

Seeing Maggie start to stir, you take hold of her hand. “Hey, it’s fine. It’s going to be okay.”

“I heard gunshots.”

“It was the Saviors, but it’s fine now.”

—

The odds were staking up against you, but Eugene came through with a plan. The saviors were waiting to see the RV appearing on the road, so if you waited until nightfall, you would have a better chance of traveling on foot without being seen while he still drives the RV to make them think your group was still on the road.

“Maggie, we are going to get you to the doctor soon,” you smile. “You and baby will be okay.”

Her skin was pale and sweaty, and you didn’t actually believe what you were saying. You had a feeling something terrible was about to happen.

After making a stretcher out of what you could find in the RV, all of you aside from Eugene start to go through the woods. Maggie, being her stubborn self, insisted she walk to Hilltop, but it wasn’t going to happen. You and Carl take out the walkers that get too close while the remaining four people take a corner of the stretcher.

You’re unsure of how long you’ve been walking for when you notice something shining on the ground. “Wait up,” you whisper, bending down to inspect the familiar jewelry. You pick it up but then quickly toss it, feeling the wetness on it. “Rick, Rick.”

He looks over at you with a panicked look in his eyes. “What is it?”

“We need to go back.” You hold up your hand so he can see the blood on it. “Rosita’s earrings; she was wearing them when she left Alexandria—”

Before you can say anything else, you are cut off by multiple people whistling. This whole thing was a trap, even the way the jewelry was laid out was so easy to find. The Saviors just wanted to torment as many people as they could.

“Go! Go!”

You take off running through the woods until a bright light blinds you, and you’re suddenly surrounded by saviors and different vehicles, making it impossible to run away from them. All of them were whistling.

Holding your gun, you stand with your back to Maggie, prepared to shoot anyone who tries to hurt her.

The man called Simon, who Rick spoke with earlier, appears and points his gun at Carl, ordering all of you to hand over your weapons. This was the first time you’d ever seen Rick look terrified, and that’s how you knew you were screwed.

—

“Y/N,” Carl’s face turns pale as he notices the blood soaking through your shirt.

“I know.”

Between running and being forced down onto your knees by the saviors, the stitches from your stab wound had pulled, and your wound was now bleeding.

“Hey, hey,” Abraham gets your attention. “Show them no goddamn fear.”

You wanted to be brave like them, but you weren’t. You felt completely helpless while you watched them force Maggie onto her knees.

A van door is opened, and Michonne, Rosita, Glenn, and Daryl are dragged from it, then forced onto the ground beside the rest of you. Simon gleefully knocks on the RV door, “Alright, let’s meet the man.”

Through teary eyes, you meet Carl’s gaze. The two of you were on opposite ends of the line-up. You were now kneeling on the ground between Glenn and Rosita.

The door opens, and a dark-haired man with a wide grin walks out, “Pissing our pants yet?”

Satan in a Sunday hat.

“Boy, so I gave a feeling we’re getting close.” The man walks back and forth along the line, sizing everyone up while holding a wooden basketball bat that had barbed wire wrapped around it. “It’s gonna be pee-pee pants city here real soon. Which one you pricks is the leader?”

“It’s this one,” Simon points to Rick. “He’s the guy.”

The man sighs, “Hi, you’re Rick, right? I’m Negan. And I do not appreciate you killing my men. Also, when I sent my people to kill your people for killing my people, you killed more of my people. Not cool. Not cool. You have no idea how not cool that shit is. But I think you’re gonna be up to speed shortly. Yeah. You are so gonna regret crossing me in a few minutes.”

You silently start to pray again, taking hold of the small silver cross between your fingers.

“You see, stick to whatever you do; no matter what, you don’t mess with the new world order. And the new world order is this: And it’s really very simple. So, even if you’re stupid, which you very well may be, you can understand it. Are you ready? Here goes, pay attention.” He points his bat in Rick's face, “Give me your shit, or I will kill you. Today was career day. We invested a lot so you would know who I am and what I can do. You work for me now. You have shit; you give it to me. That’s your job.”

While Negan continues to taunt your group, your eyes move along every single person who you know is considered family. Everyone was crying and shaking aside from Abraham and Carl.

Negan keeps repeating that he wants half your group's supplies, but that wouldn’t be enough.

“So if someone knocks on your door, you let us in. We own that door. You try to stop us, and we will knock it down. Understand?” Negan mockingly puts his hand up to his ear, “What, no answer?”

Negan reminds you of the governor.

“You don’t really think that you were gonna get through this without being punished, now did you?” Negan shakes his head. “I don’t wanna kill you people. Just want to make that clear from the get-go. I want you to work for me.”

Just like the governor wanted you all the love together at one point.

“You can’t do that if you’re dead, now, can you? I’m not growing a garden, but you killed my people—a whole damn lot of them. More than I’m comfortable with. And for that—for that you’re going to pay.”

An eye for an eye.

“So now, I’m gonna beat the holy hell out of one of you.”

The crazy bastard introduces his baseball bat as Lucille, Negan is crazy. He stands in front of Abraham and seems amused when Abraham holds his gaze and rises up on his knees. Chucking Negan moves down the line and points at Carl, “You had one of our guns.”

Carl says nothing.

Negan crouches in front of him. “You got a lot of our guns. Shit, kid, lighten up. At least cry a little.”

He starts to walk back up the line and stops in front of Maggie. “Jesus, you look shitty. I should just put you out of your misery.”

The second Negan lifts the bat up, both you and Glenn yell for him to stop. Glenn tries to reach Maggie but is pinned down to the ground by a savior.

“Nope. Nope, get him back in line,” Negan says, sounding like an unimpressed parent. “Don’t any of you do that again. I will shut that shit down, no exceptions. First ones free; it’s an emotional moment; I get it.”

You press your palm against your side in a poor attempt to stop it hurting so much, which Negan notices. He laughs, “Jesus Rick, you could have at least made it harder for me. Half your camp looks as if it’s dying off already.”

You want to cry but don’t allow yourself to, not anymore. Giving Negan the satisfaction would be more painful than the wound itself. He points to your side with his bad, “What the hell happened to you?”

“One of your men stabbed me.”

“One of my men stabbed you? A kid?” He kneels down with a smirk on his face. “So you know I have men that can and will fight for me. What does that tell you?”

“It tells me you have men who take the easy option and stab a little girl rather than actually putting up a real fight.”

His smile disappears. Negan just stares at you for a few moments until he suddenly stands and looks back over at Carl, who was glaring at him. “I’ve been trying to put two and two together, but I think I now get it; this is your little girlfriend.” He turns back to look at Rick, “And this must be your kid; you have a similar evil eye.”

“That’s enough!”

“Do not make me kill the little future serial killer; don’t make it easy on me. I gotta pick somebody, and everybody is at the table waiting for their order.”

Negan starts whistling while trying to decide who to kill.

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