FEARLESS ➳ TWD¹ [REWRITE/COMPLETED]

24 ➳ THE IRON

"WHY are we all here for?" I asked Dwight, just as I walked onto the factory floor. I spotted Mark tied to a chair while the whole population of Saviors were standing there. Dwight was up by the furnace, looking into the fire. "Dwight?"

He looked over his shoulder and simply grunted out, "We have to wait for Negan to arrive."

Taking a quick look around this place, it seriously baffles me that only one man could get so many people on his side. He was not the big man upstairs in Heaven, so... How could so many people willingly follow him to the ends of the Earth?

Then, suddenly, my vision faded from everyone but Daryl, who was standing almost directly behind Mark, holding on a mop tightly with a mop-bucket behind him. I decided to act casually and walked up beside him, which he showed some sort of emotion to.

When, abruptly, a clang noise came from high above. Everybody looked up after gasping, seeing Negan and Carl both up above us on the catwalk while we focused on him to deliver the reason of why we are all here for.

Yet, he kept clanging Lucille onto the railing until everyone would kneel for him. I looked to Daryl after seeing everyone else kneeling and he just slowly shook his head, taking a knee against his will. I rolled my eyes and did the same, taking a knee next to him.

Front and center, standing above us, Negan handed Lucille over to Carl, who has to take it to keep himself safe in this situation.

Placing his hands on the railing, he held himself up and announced, "You know the deal. What's about to happen is gonna be hard to watch. I don't want to do it." By this point, Mark is shaking and sweating not far in front of me. "I wish that I could just ignore the rules and let it slide, but I can't. Why?"

Altogether, everyone — minus myself and Daryl, of course — yelled back at Negan, "The rules keep us alive."

Coming down the stairs now, Negan says word by word, "That. Is. Right." Taking a moment to pose again at the middle of the stairs and holding himself off the railing, he continued, "We survive. We provide security for others. We bring civilization back to this world. We are the Saviors." He paused to move around a little. "But, we can't do that without rules. Rules are what make it all work. I know it's not easy, but there's always work. There is always a cost. Here, if you try to skirt it, if you try to cut that corner..."

At the end there, Negan got loud, which made Mark whimper in his chair and the rest of us to tense-up. Then, he started to chuckle — which shows just, first-hand, how bad his mood swings are. "...Then, it is the the iron for you," he finished, seemingly normal about it now.

I looked to my right and seen how Daryl appeared, obviously of slight mixture of being scared and pissed. I placed my hand on his bent knee and he flinched, but relaxed after a moment. I kept looking up at Negan because I did not want the attention on us. But, then, I seen Daryl turn his gaze back to Dwight, who looked back at Daryl.

Dwight was probably one of the first to get the infamous iron, himself. This is why half of his face is the way that it is. I felt bad for Dwight, but I don't know how bad I did, though.

"On your feet," Negan concluded, which I silently thanked since I did not feel like being on my one knee anymore.

Everyone stood up, but Dwight was the very last one to. Negan made his way down until he was finally on the same floor as us. Doctor Carson was standing to my right as Daryl spun around to be on my left now.