State of destruction- The Walking Dead [Alden x Maggie][2/2]

3- Change

Hershel locked his door behind himself immediately. He needed to be alone. Now that he knew how his father had died the world seemed different. Those dark and dangerous places he'd been warned about made sense all of a sudden. A baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire, that was a horrible way to go out. Images flashed through his head. They were all charcoal sketches unfolding like a repeating movie. The only way to get them out of his head was to put them to paper.

He went to work immediately. His hands were stained in charcoal dust within minutes. Someone knocked on his door and he hurriedly covered his horrific sketches with a folder.

"Hershel," Adam's little voice piped up. "I need help with my new Lego set." A short pause. "Please."

"Not now Adam, I'm doing my homework," he lied.

"Oaky, I'll ask someone else," he replied and he left. It would've been more fun if Hershel had wanted to help him, but Tara would do as well.

Hershel continued sketching. He'd never seen a picture of his father; they didn't exist. All he had was the pocket watch passed from his grandfather, to his father, to him. He'd often been told that he looked a lot like his father, but his father's face was a little rounder. Each sketch carried Hershel down a darker path. The images in his mind didn't disappear after they wer transferred onto paper. His sketches only became more bloody and the face of his father became more and more deformed by the bat.

Another knock on his door shook him from his spiral. Just like earlier he hid his sketches underneath his folder.

"Hershel, it's mom. Your dad told me what you talked about today and you deserved my answers in full as well," Maggie said calmly. She still didn't want to talk about this, but it was the right thing to do

"One second," he called back. He needed to hide his drawings better. His mom couldn't see them. He quickly decided to stuff his latest sketches underneath his mattress. Then he hurried to the door and unlocked it.

Maggie couldn't hide her concern for her oldest. "Are you alright?"

"I had better days," he admitted. "Don't be mad at dad, I asked and wouldn't have taken no as an answer."

"I was angry, but in the end you have a right to know," she replied as she pulled the door closed behind her. "I just wished it was never something you had to know."

"Is that really what happened?" He asked. "A baseball bat wrapped in barb wire."

"Yes," she swallowed thickly. Her throat was as dry as sandpaper. "Negan picked him. Your father used his last words to tell me how much he loved me." She held back tears. "Then when it was done Negan mocked me like it was all a big joke. He acted like he hadn't just killed the love of my life."

"And dad, uh, Alden, was the one that planned it?"

"On Negan's orders." She sat down on the edge of his bed. "It's complicated."

"If he did it, then why..." Hershel trailed off and shook his head. "How could you love him if he's responsible?"

Maggie sighed, "because in Alden's version of events he takes on more guilt than he is responsible for."

"I don't follow," Herschel frowned. "He said he was being honest, he probably told you what he told me. So did he speak the truth or not?"

"He did, but he has a lot of guilt about that night." Maggie rubbed her hand across her thigh, hoping it would ease her uneasiness. I didn't. "Glenn saved his and Rose's life, that's how they met."

"I know, that's one of the stories I've been told for as long as I can remember."

"That night he tried to save your father, but failed," she said. "He'll never forgive himself."