UNSTEADY .. n

15

As the group reached the gates, almost all of them felt a familiar pit in their stomachs as a truck approached in the distance.

Negan.

Rick motioned for the others to halt as the vehicle came to a stop a mere yard away from the rusted gates. Everyone stood in anticipation as the well-hated man popped out of the passenger side sporting a twisted grin.

"Ah, my buddies! My lovely subjects, my damn slaves." He slithered menacingly. Enid clenched her jaw. "I believe you have something of mine."

A silence filled the distance between the groups. Saviors began filing out of the truck, showing that there were several more of them than there were people ready to fight for Alexandria.

"Where's Amelia?" Rick asked in his scratched voice. He squinted against the sun, hand clenched around a kitchen knife. It was a silly replacement for his usual hand gun, but it was all he really had in that moment. Negan laughed.

"I could ask you the same thing, prick." He rested his hands on his hips, jaw tilted up in superiority. "A certain fiery glass of whiskey has somehow disappeared from my clutches, and I think y'all had some sort of say in it."

Silence.

"Where's the girl?" Negan's game was fun.

He loved having the upper hand. He'd been that way since he was a kid. The other kids his age in his neighborhood wanted what he had. Growing up in a shitty part of the country had it's perks. The local polices and law systems didn't branch out to the outskirts of town because it was simply too much work to sort out every little detail of felonies caused by hilljacks. That gave more room for vigilante folk to arise, and you could bet your asses Negan was one of them.

Instead of trying to fix things in the way they were supposed to be, Negan would turn the tables so that the scales would tilt in his favor. Whether it was getting girls at his school to have sex with him or harassing kids for their savings, Negan could do it. He had the muscle and the shotgun in his dad's closet. Negan was a badass.

Even now, he had his men ready to fire at these people for hiding his property from him. Negan was in control.

Negan was always in control.

"We don't have her." Carl spat angrily. The patch covering his eye was filthy and in need of a change. The sight made Negan laugh.

"Ain't you a joke!" He hooted. "Y'know it's bad when your nasty-ass bandages are scarier than your 'threatening' tone." Negan chuckled.

"Negan, stop playing. Where is Amelia?" Rick asked in a voice that was half of who he used to be. The shell of his leadership barely clung to the idea that if he followed Negan's rules, his people would be safe. But even that ideology was being questioned because a girl was missing and Negan seemed to not even know where she was.

He let out a quick chuckle before shaking his head.

"Okay, here's what we're gonna do; you're gonna open this gate here and let my men in. We're gonna give a quick peek-a-boo in your shit so we can take our girl, and then we're gonna take some stuff for lying to me about having the girl, and maybe even give Lucille here a quick snack." Negan swung the bat onto his shoulder before flashing a sickening smirk. "Why don't you go on and open the gate, little piggy?" He tapped on the wire teasingly.

Rick stood still.

Negan waited before clearing his throat. "Perhaps you didn't hear me correctly. Open the fucking gate."

There was hesitation, but Spencer eventually stepped up and undid the chained lock around the pole holding the gate in place. Negan smiled in satisfaction before stepping inside and looking around.

Oh, how he loved to make people squirm.

--

Negan sighed, running a hand through his hair.

"Well I suppose y'all weren't lying when you said she wasn't here." He said in a snake-like voice. Rick nodded.

"We have no idea where she's at, okay?" Spencer huffed in frustration. Negan's ears perked at his words, and he paused.

"You don't, hm?" Slowly, he turned around to face the young leader. Negan mosied over to him, eyes scanning the man, a light smirk playing at his lips.

"We knew she went after you, and that's it. It didn't do any good for you to come in her and tear our shit up looking when we told you she wasn't here to begin with." Rick knew what he was doing was going to end badly.

"Let me get this straight-- you think I should have just trusted you when you said you didn't know where my girl was, right?" Spencer kept his eyes locked with Negan's.

"Yes."

"Tell me, have you given me any reason to trust you? Have any of you yellow-bellied bitches given me reason to trust you?" Negan's voice was low. Spencer gulped, but he held his ground. "You really haven't, buddy."

With that, Negan pulled Lucille off his shoulder and landed a square hit to the top of Spencer's head. There were a few shouts of shock, but the others knew better than to intervene.

"Don't you tell me how to run my networks, boy." He hit him again. This time, Spencer fell to the ground. His eyes were bulged slightly, a dent prevalent on the top of his head. Negan hit the side this time. "This is my kingdom, and I am your king, do you understand me jackass?" Negan hit once more before tossing Lucille to the ground.

He turned to the rest of Alexandria, some shaking in their own boots. "Y'hear that? Don't none of you ever try tellin' me how to rule my shit because it is mine. Not yours, mine."

A silence had filled the town. Rick hung his head in grievance at the loss of yet another member. Carl looked away, the clench of his jaw being the only thing stopping him from shouting a string of obscenities at Negan.

Enid felt tears well in her eyes. She hadn't seen the murder of Abraham and Glenn. She hadn't seen the cruelty of Negan and his men, but yet here she stood now, eyes glued to a lifeless and bloodied body of a man she had barely known. He was dead.

A few birds flew overhead, and Negan stood proud with a smirk. He had reign over these people. The only thing pulling him from his pride was the sudden voice of a girl, anger burning in her throat.

"Negan."

"So the flower has decided to finally show up?"