Heaven in Hiding (Negan)

Chapter 24

We were all shooting walkers to try to thin the herd. I turned to Jim.
"Radio the other outposts. Let them know what happened here. Tell them all to be on guard for anything!" I shouted. He nodded and ran off.
It felt like we were shooting forever and the walkers didn't thin out at all. If anything it seemed like more. We had the stairs blocked and the workers all upstairs. My gun clicked. It was empty and I didn't have anymore bullets on me. "Try to thin this out more. I'm going to make sure everyone's okay upstairs."
I ran up and saw everyone huddled together and you could feel the humidity in the air. It was hard to breath at all. The generators must be off. I ran into the meeting room and looked out the now broken Windows. Ricks people were gone, all that was left was the walkers. I scanned the grounds looking for Negan. Anything of his. His jacket or Lucille, a boot, anything. Nothing. There was nothing. Everyone was safe and now I had time to let it go. I fell to the floor and let my tears come. My face in my hands as I quietly sobbed. He was either dead or stuck out there. It wasn't safe for us to go find him, I knew that. There was nothing I could do.
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Negan sat with his back against the wall of this shitty trailer. The priest from Ricks group doing the same a yard away.
"You're an asshole." He spoke.
"Yeah. I am." Negan agreed "But he's gonna get people killed. You know that. The ginger and that Asian kid that's on me But I didn't get them killed. That was Rick. I saw you stop and get the breaded prick ,Gregory. Why would you stop?"
"What I fear is a fruitless death." Negan chuckled and silence fell upon them again. Negans mind went to Prue. She was inside the Sanctuary, he made damn sure of that.
"The girl." The priest spoke making Negan look toward him.
"What girl?" Negan asked playing dumb.
"The one you're with. Does She mean anything to you?" Another chuckle escaped his throat.
"Yeah. Father, she's means the fucking world to me. I think that's pretty damn obvious."
"Yet You put her in danger."
"I didn't do shit. Rick the fucking Prick is the one putting people in danger. You know who's in there? Fucking people. Workers. We have women and children. Got a few pregnant women. One of whom is Prues best friend. I protect people. I try to make things as easy as possible where the least amount of people fucking die. But Rick. Rick likes to do this shit. Getting his people killed and my people. Getting people who are just living their lives. Killed for nothing."
More silence. The walkers slamming their hands and bodies against the thin metal walls echoing in the almost empty space.
"We'll just wait it out until my people can figure something out. One thing that sure is ass. If my people think I'm dead. Lot of folks gonna die in there."
"Why?" Gabriel asked. Negan looked over to him.
"Listen. I don't have shit to confess. Let me ask you somethin. Why'd you become a priest?"
"I love god and people. Wanted to bring them together. Help people through their difficult times.help through their weaknesses."
"Well look at that. That's my thing. I like to help people too. Been doin it one way or another my whole life. Wanna know why people are gonna start dyin? Because I'm not there to stop it." The sound of walkers now deafening, making it hard to hear or speak. Negan let out a sigh.
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After I gathered myself I got the top few of us back in the meeting room.
"We have to assume Negans dead." Reggie spoke up as she looked at me.
"Well, he's not. I know he's not. Besides. I'm Negan. All of us here. We are Negan and don't fucking forget it. There's a lot of shit going down right now. We're all stressed out."I said with my arms crossed.
"We should send the fence crew out." She said.
"Can't. That herd is way too thick. They won't make it. As much as I want to have someone go look for Negan. We can't risk it. He wouldn't."
"We can do it. We get about 40 workers and have them start going -" Reggie was cut off.
"Inadequate." Eugene spoke up. He pretty much said what I did in a more complicated way.
"That's the point." She said. "So we lose some workers. We get an actual group to go and grab Negan."
"That is a shitty idea. Reggie. You realize that'll just pin the workers against us. We need to protect them at all costs." I told her.
"Right now we can't do anything about that. What we need to find out is who let this happen. Someone from in here was and still is feeding information to out there." Gavin spoke up. "They know all and see all. Sometimes it don't take a gun. The right kind of rat can kill plenty of people." He was right. I hadn't even though of that at all.
Simon got up.
"Alright. We're gonna find the coward who did this to us and kill him very slowly infront of everyone here." Simon said with an evil grin before he left. I let out a breath and stood up.
"I'm going to check on Jen. Rest of you. Pass out some water to people who need it most. The kids and the women." I grabbed my unopened water bottle and made my way to the room I had Jen in. I smiled and handed it to her. "You okay in here?"
"Yeah Prudence I'm fine. How are you? I know Negans out there somewhere." Jen said before she took a swig of water.
"Yeah. I'm trying to help handle this. I know Negan. He'll be fine. He knows how to weasel out of anything." I said, trying to make myself feel better. Truth was I was worried sick. The longer he's missing the more likely he's dead and the clock was ticking.
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"You helped the weak before all this?" Gabriel spoke. Negan looked over to him.
"Kids. You don't show em the way. They turn into assholes. Little assholes turn into grown assholes. So you show em the way. Adults need it too. Laws, religion, government. Everyone's weak."
"Everyone?"
"Everyone." Negan got up and broke a small piece of wood to reveal a walker clawing at them. "We'll wait a bit more. See if my people can pull it together."
"Carl. Told us about your wives. Is the girl one of them?" Negan chuckled.
"Oh Gabe I tried like hell to get her to be a wife but she was better then that and she knew it. We're together sure. But she ain't a wife. She's more then that. She's my right hand man."
"Do you love her?" He asked. Negan stared at him for a while before looking away.
"More then you know Father."
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Again. We were all in the room. Talking things over.
"The roads have been clear. Weren't we supposed to get a truck from the Kingdom today?" I asked looking over at Gavin.
"Yeah. And they never miss a delivery. Something happened. That Rick guy happened." Then The door flew open. It was Lura.
"They're coming up the stairs." She spoke out of breath.
"The walkers?" Simon asked.
"The workers." Simon sighed and got up. We all followed. There were tons of workers in the hall.
"Workers are to stay on the ground level." Simon poke loudly.
"It's too hot down there." One said.
"And our Lovely Prudence supplied everyone who needed it with a bottle of water. Which we were In Short supply of might I add."
"When you gonna fix the power?" He asked.
"It doesn't need fixing. We're conserving fuel. It's a shared sacrifice."
"Oh. We're sharin now?" The guys asked. The rage in Simons eyes was obvious as he went to lunge at the man. Dwight and I grabbed Simon and held him back.
"Listen! We're going to get through this. We just need some time to get everything figured out!" I said loudly.
"We need more water!" Someone shouted from the back.
"We're in low supply right now. We're rationing it out." I said. Soon it was a screaming match. Workers shouting and asking questions.
"Where's Negan? Is he dead?" They asked.
"Everyone. Has to return to the factory floor now!!" Simon yelled.
I looked over and saw a worker pull a gun.
Before I could react Reggie pulled hers out and shot him. The gunshot echoed in the hallway and soon the workers started to freak out. That when I heard it. That sing song whistle from down the hall. My heart sped up as it got closer and louder. The workers kneeled and around the corner came Negan. Covered in Walker guts and sweat with the priest from Ricks group. Everyone was kneeling but me as a smile pulled at my lips. Negan looked at me then to Regina.
"Now Regina. Why would you do something like that? I'm guessing a lot of you though I was dead. Well, here's a little refresher on who I am. I have a leather jacket. I have Lucille and my nut sack is made of steal. I am not dyin until I'm damn good and ready." My feet started to move on their own as I made my way to him. I didn't care if most of the workers were up here. I got to him and my arms wrapped around his neck and my lips crashed onto his. Negans strong arm around my waist pulled me into him. My lips left his and he smirked down to me. "Miss me Doll?"
"You have no idea." I spoke with a frog in my throat. He moved his gaze from me to the people.
"Now I am in need of a shower,a sandwich and some time with Prue here. But after that we're gonna figure out how all this shit happened. And then we're gonna get back to what we've always done. We save people."
"Thank you Negan." The works said.
"Guys. Gently take this man to number two. Gently." Negan said and pulled me along with him.