BLOODLINES [twd]

{9}

No matter where Lucas looked, he just saw Glenn's body.

So, he placed Maggie's head on his chest so she could rest and stared at his brother's body on the other side of the lineup.

Maggie stained Lucas' shirt with her tears, but he just held her and let her cry through the night and into the morning. 

He stared at his brother's body. He just watched.

He took in the color of Glenn's shirt. The chain peeping out of his pocket was the pocketwatch that Hershel gave him. The shoes he was wearing. How the laces were double knotted.

He counted how many rocks were stained with Glenn's blood. He saw loose strands of hair poking out of the brain matter. Glenn's eye had rolled to the side and was almost staring back at Lucas. 

When the indention of Glenn's dead body was traced in his mind, he knew there was no forgetting it. It was like those optical illusions he saw in school- the kind where you had to stare at a dot in an image for so long and then look at a wall. The image would still be in your eyes and you could see a face or figure on the wall. Just like that.. except it was the lifeless body of his beloved big brother.

He counted to 500 and back down. He did it again. And again. His shoulder was numb from Maggie's weight, but he didn't tell her to move. His knees were numb and raw from the gravel, but he didn't move them in order to sit in a more comfortable position.

He counted how many Saviors were around them. seventy-two. He retraced the names he remembered to the faces around. Negan. Simon. Dwight. Tony. Skinny Joey. Drew. Marcus. Tanner. Joeseph. Xavier. 

The group wasn't allowed to speak. Neither to each other, nor a Savior. Lucas found that out when he tried to ask Simon if Maggie could at the very least lay down or have a blanket. Simon shot him down before he muttered two words and no one else spoke up ever since.

The sun rose. Negan returned with Rick and the RV. There was something so sickening about the way that Negan manhandled Rick. 

The first time Lucas saw Rick, the man was a stranger shooting walkers in the middle of Atlanta.

He recalled how he, Glenn, Andrea, Merle, Jacqui, T-Dog, and Morales were on a run to the city.. Lucas saw Rick running and pointed it out to Glenn. They had a brief argument on if it was a real person or not.

Lucas swore that geeks didn't run like that. Glenn swore that no one would be that much of a dumbass.

But, when they radioed over, hoping that the tank Rick had locked himself in also had a signal, the brothers found that Rick was indeed dumbass. Glenn was sure to call Rick that and the joke stuck for years.

When they retrieved Rick from the streets, Lucas was excited. He and Glenn had saved someone's life. They were heroes.

The first thing Rick did was point a gun in their faces. Glenn shouted 'not dead!' and Rick lowered the gun. Lucas remembered the climb up the ladder of the side of the building. He remembered that T-Dog and Morales used baseball bats to kill the geeks in the alley.

There was so much irony to it now.

Glenn saying he wasn't dead.. Rick being saved by the Rhee brothers.. The baseball bats..

The fact that Lucas and Rick were the only ones still alive from that little run in Atlanta.

Lucas wondered how different life would've turned out had he and Glenn not argued. What if they just left Rick to die?

Carl and Lori would've never seen Rick again. They would've kept believing he was dead. Shane and Lori would be fine- maybe even a normal couple. That alone was a premise that made Lucas feel nauseous. 

Would they have gone to the CDC? The farm? Would they have met the Greene family? Would Maggie be a part of Lucas' family?

 Would they have made it as long as they did? Or, would some of those back at the camp still be alive? Maybe those that went on the Atlanta run would've all died in that little store. Maybe they would've used Rick's death as a distraction and bolted home.

There were so many "maybe" and "what if"s. Lucas didn't really like to think about those thoughts because they usually ended up sending him on a spiral where he questioned every decision he and his family ever made.

What if Michonne and Hershel didn't go to burn bodies? What if they had killed those prisoners the second they met? What if Dawn didn't demand Noah to stay at Grady? What if Glenn didn't get the flu? What if Terminus hadn't left signs up? 

All those questions just made Lcuas think about his present circumstances.

How many things could've gone differently.. what was the one thing that he did wrong that led a butterfly effect to Glenn getting killed?

What if T-Dog never saved them in his church van? What if Merle never took Glenn and Maggie?

Lucas' head was so loud. He didn't even hear Negan demanding things in the middle of the crowd again. He didn't feel the gun at the back of his head. He didn't see Carl get up. He didn't see Negan threaten Carl's life. He didn't see Rick nearly forced to cut Carl's hand off.

He did see Rick break down crying. That's what brought him back to earth.

When was the last time Lucas had seen Rick cry? Lori? It'd been awhile.

Rick was so proud of the things they've accomplished. Rick swore to the group that they couldn't lose anymore. They had the world beat and in the palm of their hands.

Rick was a stranger. Then, a friend. A leader. A fatherly figure to Lucas and Glenn. And now.. now Rick Grimes was a broken shell of a man.

Lucas' spirit crushed at the sight of Rick bowing to Negan in submission.

It was over.

Rick was broken. Glenn was dead. Abraham was dead. Alexandria was prisoner to the Saviors.

It was all over.