The Ruins Part 2 (Sequel to The Ruins)

Chapter 61

"I know you," Max said. "You're the Greenman."

He nodding. They were in the Greenman's cabin, deep in the woods. When he responded, he got up and walked into the small kitchen. A moment later there was the aroma of brewing tea. Lugh sat next to Alec and starts to question him on the relationship between him and Greenman.

"How do you know each other?"

"Before Negan, I was alone with my older sister for a while. We stayed in the woods, never trusted people, making ourselves assholes. When my sister died, I never contacted with any person. Then Greenman came to me." He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "He took care of me, didnt speak to me, just sat there until I let myself go. He told me to never distant myself, and be who I was. And I did. Meeting another asshole like me, Negan, become a group, then meet you guys, befriend Mal, and fell in love with you, Lugh."

Sam sat curled into a large rattan chair, knees drawn up, arms wrapped around his shins. He was tired from walking so long and his mind kept racing on many things that happened.

Now they were in his house to rest. It was filled with plants of all kinds. They hung in baskets from the ceiling and stood in pots along the walls. Boxes of them hung on both sides of the open windows. Birds sang and chattered in the trees outside, and a squirrel came in and sat eating nuts from the bowl on the table. The Greenman did not chase it away.

A large cat came through the kitchen window, cast a wary eye at Sam, then a longer look at the squirrel, but strolled across the room toward Sam. For a moment it peered up at him with luminous eyes. Then it hopped up into his chair and rubbed itself against him, its purr louder than the larks in the trees. Sam unwrapped his arms and the cat stood on its back legs, resting its front paws on his knee, leaning its face toward his. He gathered the cat up in his arms and held it to his chest as if it was the most precious thing in the world.

The cat meowed softly and continued to purr. "The cat likes you." Said Vix, sitting across from him.

"I guess," he scratched behind it's ear, earning a deeper purr. "I'm so stupid to let Benny out here."

"Benny chose himself to do this."

"He can be stupid, too." His words were quick, and he stopped and shook his head again. "In town... Benny is smart. He know science and books and stars and history. But out here... he isn't smart."

"Tell me why he isn't." Vix leaned on her forearms and regarded with a kindly smile.

He shrugged. "He never seen what I've had. Before... it was me and Mal, and others. We were a group of friends like you guys. I always hanged with Mal all the time. We knew the world because we are born in it. How it was. How to survive and fight. But after whatever happened out there, Mal changed and she never told me because I didn't understand. That was killing people."

He shook his head at the memory. "Everything then changed when Lucius destroyed the gates of the quarantine zones, and the Flyer Frontiers died, it was only me and Tom and everything else. I finally understood what she had gone through. I had to do everything for Tom when he was once badly hurt. And that scared me because I was alone. I lost people. Everyone did. Then we found Negan, and he took us to Fairview."

He clenched his fist, then added, "I disgusted the place. I felt like Mal; uncertain, a stranger, a person who hates that place because it wasn't well protected and people never been what her or I had gone through in such a young age. That's why I think Benny is stupid."

"Maybe," she conceded. "But people who were born before the Black Night, they had to adjust the world. Had to figure a way to find themselves to fight, survive, and to join groups- until five years after Flyer Frontiers came in. Someday, he'll come around."