The other Dixon- The walking dead fanfic

XLIII

I been told to meet in the church as soon as I could by Glenn, I'm not sure what it was, but it sounded important, he had even asked Jay to come along.

I had already gotten Glenn to give me a brief run down of what had happened, about Negan and how they were treating Hilltop. They had made a deal, if we took out the saviours, Hilltop would help us, give us food.

"And we can work with Hilltop, Maggie hammered out a deal, we're getting food, eggs, butter, vegetables, but they're not just giving it away. These saviours, they almost killed Daryl, Sasha and Abraham. Now sooner or later, they would've found us, just like the wolves, just like Jesus did," I still couldn't believe Rick was actually calling the man Jesus.

"If they found us first, they would kill some of us. Make us work for them. And we would try to fight, but by then, in that kind of fight, low on food, we could loose. This is the only way to be sure, as sure as we can get, that we can win." I agreed, it sounded fair, they sounded like pricks so, they have it coming I suppose.

"We do this for Hilltop, its how we keep this place. Feed this place. Now, it's not up to me, so, if anyone objects, here's your chance to say." I looked around, nobody looked like they would say anything, until they did.

Morgan stood up,
"You're sure we can do it? We can beat them?" Rick looked at him for a moment,
"What this group has done, what we've learnt, what we've become, all of us. Yes, I'm sure."

"Then all we have to do is tell them that."
"I ain't being funny but these guys don't seem exactly... up for discussion." I butted in. Sure, there were some situations you could talk your way out of, this wasn't one of them.
"It's a choice you give them. It's a way out, for them and us."

"We have to come for them before they come for us," Rick spoke, and he was right. We had the element of surprise at the moment, if we tried to talk to them, they would be ready, they would be waiting for us.
"We have to kill them." Rick continued, 
"When there's life, there's possibility." Morgan said,
"Yeah, a possibility of them killing us. I think I speak on behalf of everyone when I say I like being alive." I commented immediately.

"Okay. Morgan wants to talk to them first. I think that would be a mistake but that's not up to me. I'll talk to the people at home, the guards on shift, does anyone else here want to talk to them first?" Nobody said anything, nobody agreed, everyone just sat there, waiting, "Then I think that's settled."

"We don't all have to kill. But if you stay here, you have to be ready, and you do have to accept it." Rick walked down the isle, out of the church, leaving us alone. I knew what we had to do, what it meant to us, to our future, to everyone who lives here, has lived here, to everyone who will live here.

---

I sat quietly in the back of the RV, looking over the rifle I had been given. I had my pistol and machete too, though it was likely I wouldn't have much chance to use them.
"You should stay back, with Maggie." Daryl told me, I knew she was supposed to stay with the cars.

"Nah man, I should be in there." I shook my head, looking from the window back to my brother, "I'll be with Glenn and Heath anyway, we'll be okay." I told him as the cars came to a halt, everyone climbing out, meeting out the front.

"We'll peel off every quarter mile, meet back here in a couple hours, see what we got." I nodded, pulling the rifle's strap so the gun lay on my back, taking out my machete, I needed to save the ammo, the noise would alert them anyways.

Glenn, Heath and I ran through the overgrown fields, attacking any walkers in sight. I took down the last one and the other two joined me, staring down at it,
"What do you think?" Heath asked, looking at the walker.

We were trying to find a head that resembles Gregory to bring to the building, that way they would open the gates for us and we wouldn't have to break in.
"Maybe.. if we cut the hair, trim the beard."

He stood up and I glanced at Heath, noticing how anxious he looked,
"We're gonna have to kill those people." He said, making the two of us go silent.
"Look, I've been lucky," He continued, "I haven't had to do it before, have you two?"

Glenn glanced at me,
"I've been lucky too," He said before Heath looked at me for my response.
"I've uh, not been so.. lucky."
"What's it like?" Heath asked, following me as I picked up the walker head, heading in the general direction of the cars, "It's just uh, I want to be ready, you know?" He continued.

"You can't be ready for it. There's nothing you can do to prepare yourself. You just have to hope that afterwards, you can forget, otherwise it'll eat you up. The actual killing part is easy, it's how to deal with it after that's hard."

I saw the two give each other an uneasy glance and I picked up the pace, we were going to be late back to the RV, the quicker we got back, the quicker we could get this over and done with.

word count: 937
total word count: 43, 214