Promise? »» C.G.

Chapter 62»»The End

"What happened to Rick's kid?" Negan asked. "Why is he such a badass?" We were eating dinner together. Like a family. The only real meal he's let me have.

"Um," I said, as I ate.

"Don't eat with a mouth full. I know it's good," he told me.

"Sorry," I said as I finished the bite in my mouth. "We lived in a prison one time. Before I lost them. And this guy, who is kinda like you, set walker's loose on us. It was bad. His mom, Carl's mom, she was pregnant with the baby that you saw." He hummed and nodded as I talked. "She was having the baby. Me and my mom, we've seen cattle born so we tried helping her through it. She had to have a C-Section and, my mom...she did it. And it killed her. Lori was her name. It killed Lori and...my mom left. I held his hand when he did it." I looked down at my food. "He stopped it. Had to." I continued to eat and we continued to talk.

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"Did you tell him that?" Carl asked me. I didn't look at him.

"That is screwed up," Negan said as Carl asked me. "Ergo, we need someone in charge who's willing to do whatever it takes to make sure that shit doesn't happen. Oh. Wait. That's me."

"Bad stuff does happen, but we can figure this out," Carl told him. "We can stop this."

"Oh, now you want to talk? See, your dad had it that I died, no matter what. He gave my people a choice. Not me. Now we're gonna need a new understanding. Apologies, punish--."

"Kill me." I turned to Carl a little shocked he said that. My mouth gaped.

"What did you say?" Negan asked.

"If you have to kill someone, if there has to be punishment, then kill me. I'm serious. You want (Y/n) to do it, she'll do it, but you can't have her after."

"You wanna die?"

"No, I don't. But I will. It's gonna happen. And i-if me dying could stop this, if it can make things different--for us, for you, for all those other kids -- it'd be worth it. I mean, was this the plan? Was it supposed to be this way? Is this who you wanted to be?" It started and we got down.

"Son of a bitch, Carl!" Negan called out. He called Carl an asshole. There was guns and fire. Carl had fell. I helped him up as there was an explosion. We grabbed the bags and took off. Carl put smoke bombs down as we took off. The church exploded.

"Come on," I told him. We kept going. A car exploded in front of us. It knocked us both down. I hit my head. I heard ringing. Carl grabbed my hand.

"We have to keep going," he told me. I nodded a bit. We leaned on each other as we stood up. Carl stopped at one point. He was in pain. I held him up. I tried talking to him, but it didn't seem like he was listening. Glass shattered. I pulled Carl and we took off as the houses exploded. I held Carl, but I knew he was in so much pain. I held his side where he was bit as we kept moving. Maybe it could help. Someone spotted us and I threw a smoke bomb. We were able to hide. We watched them run off. We kept going. Carl was...bad. I got him leaned up against the wall. He was sweating. I held his hand, waiting for his body to give out and die. I leaned my head on his shoulder. Eventually, everyone had understood what happened. Rick and Michonne found us. I was crying. I had been crying. Rick and Michonne knelt down. There were explosions in the distance.

"I-I don't," Rick started.

"Dad," Carl said.

"How...?"

"Dad...it's all right. It's gotta be. I wasn't sure if you'd make it back before...but just in case, you know..." He handed Michonne all the letters he wrote. "I wanted to make sure I was able to say goodbye."