Deadland

Chapter 119- Cave

"Encourage your paranoia about us...which will push you into bad decisions. Places like this are cruel promises to their people and they crumble at the smallest nick. Hell, I'm gonna enjoy watching you rip each other apart over what to do with me." Donte says, leaning closer to Gabriel. "Just like with Negan." He whispers. 

"Is that what you want? A public reckoning? A chance to be heard?" Gabriel questions. 

Donte says, "That's what you'll give me. Because it's right." 

"We helped you." Rosita hisses. 

"Why? 'Cause you wanted another doctor around? You got something from me, too. Don't pretend you didn't." 

I roll my eyes at Donte, "Yeah, like what? An itch in our asses?" I scoff, grabbing the cigarette back from Daryl. Rosita mumbles something in Spanish and walks across the room to the windows. 

He looks at me, "I helped Beatrice when she was sick and Siddiq had to take care of Coco." I straighten up and clench my jaw, narrowing my eyes. "No one is actually kind. We are selfish. We are brutal. Come on." He turns to Gabriel. "Even seeing all those heads on spikes didn't teach you what people are?" He says before turning back to me. "Seeing Damien and Cato's snarling, green, decapitated heads." 

I grunt and grab a fist full of hair on the back of his head, slamming his nose into the ground with full force. He grunts in pain and lays on the floor for a moment, absorbing the ache in his whole face. Just as I do that, Aaron walks into the infirmary. I pay no mind, all I can feel is my breath catch on a rock in my throat. 

"You. You are my best friend. You are the reason I love waking up every morning even in this shit-dick of a world." 

"What the fuck is a shit-dick?" 

"This world. And it would have been a hell of a lot worse without you." My mouth decides to move into a downturned smile at Damien's words.

"You have this-this thing in your brain that makes you think everyone is out to get you. Like that the fact your face is plastered on my heart is just so that I can get close so I can hurt you but...Adrian it's not true. Oh my god," He scoffs. "It is so not true. You should have seen the look on everyone's face. Carl's, Rick's, Carol's, Alyssa's. You are so loved Adrian, but," He pauses, trying to find the right words as his eyes scan from my metal foot to my face.

"I love you most...maybe tied with Alyssa but I love you most. And I don't tell people how much I love them like this so...take a fuckin' win and stop denying it." 

I smile and chuckle, "I love you too, Damien. So much. You're my brother, my bird." I pull him into a hug again. He kisses my cheek and reciprocates the hug. 

I hold my arm up to my mouth and storm out, shoving Aaron aside. I step out of the house just as a sob breaks through my lips. I run down the street and to the graveyard where Damien and Cato's homemade gravesticks stare at me. I fall to my knees and bawl, falling to my side and hugging myself as if Damien and Cato are. 

"Damien," I wail, putting my hand on his grave. "Damien, Cato, please come back. Please." I squeeze my eyes shut and try to imagine their faces so I don't forget. "Please!" I've never felt this gut-wrenching feeling before. My mom died, yes, but I was thirteen. She didn't save my life, she didn't save Alyssa's when she was shot, she didn't make me smile when I thought nobody else could. She wasn't them. Nobody is. Nobody ever will be.

I just want my best friends back.

I would give anything, absolutely anything to have them back. I would go through Nick for the rest of my life, go through the Claimers on top of that, feel the agony of getting my foot cut off over and over again. Anything. But I can't.