detroit rock city --- kiss
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[POV]
JJ rambled on and on about how she should've helped out more with the plan as she and Carl walked Judith around the community.
"I just feel like- I don't know. Maybe I should've suggested an explosive of some sort..." JJ huffed.
"And then it could've drawn more walkers." Carl contradicted. "You're stressing out about the wrong things."
JJ rolled her eyes and looked to her nephew, who had his eyes on Ron and Enid a distance away. "I think you're the one stressing about the wrong things."
"Well, weren't you all stressed out with your crush on Daryl?"
"No." She scoffed, crossing her arms, "I'm not stressed out about Daryl."
"So, something happened?" Carl smirked.
JJ shook her head, "no, no...you and I, we're not talking about that."
"Okay, but why do you get to like Daryl but I don't get to like Enid?"
"We can stop talking about Daryl now." JJ's face heated up, "And I never said you couldn't like Enid." She laughed at her teenage nephew. "I said, don't stress about it. Look," She turned him towards the two other teens. "if she was into him, you'd be able to tell by her body language."
"How so?"
JJ shrugged like it was obvious, "for starters, she'd be a lot closer to him. And her eye contact wouldn't be with that tree on the opposite side of the road."
Carl nodded, "why are you so good at that?"
"Please," She scoffed, "Maggie would make me go on all of her first dates incognito to see if the dude was into her or not."
"Seriously?" Carl smiled.
"Very."
"Carl?" A voice from behind them startled the two. Father Gabriel stood waiting for a response.
JJ looked him up and down, "the hell do you want?"
"You two heard what I told Deanna about your group."
"Heard it?" JJ sassily crossed her arms, "Damn right. And you're lucky I'm not beating your ass right now."
"Aunt J." Carl calmed, continuing the conversation with Gabriel, "what do you want?"
"It was about me, not you or your group. I know that now. I want to help. You tried to teach me back at my church. But I'm ready to learn now."
"I think you need to tell everybody." Carl stated.
Gabriel nodded, giving a defeated smile, "Yeah, I think you're right."
The two began to part ways, but Carl made one last remark, "Come by around 3:00. We'll start with the machete."
In that moment, JJ realized her nephew was growing up in so many ways.
"Guess you got that from your dad."
"What?" Carl raised an eyebrow.
"You're too kind for your own good."
♮♮♮
Carl and JJ were just finishing putting Judith up for her nap when they heard the screams from outside. The two rushed to the window to see the streets being infiltrated by strangers. They were ruthless too. Not one of them held back brutally attacking the people of Alexandria.
Carl and JJ rushed to meet Carol on the stairs, "We saw from upstairs."
"JJ, you stay here and keep Carl and Judith safe."
Carol ran out before JJ could protest.
"I'll go make sure Judith's okay. Give her a bottle to help stay quiet." Carl suggested.
"Good call." JJ nodded, readying her gun at the door, prepared for the worst.
When the doorknob began to rattle, she slowly inched forward, not backing down. The door opened and JJ lowered her gun, seeing who it was.
"Shit, Enid. I could've killed you." JJ closed and locked the door behind her.
"Yeah, but you didn't."
Carl trampled down the stairs. "What happened?"
"Enid here doesn't know how to knock apparently."
Enid handed the cluster of keys to Carl, "I have these. Didn't want them to have them." She followed Carl and JJ into the kitchen. "And I wanted to say goodbye."
JJ's head whipped toward the young girl, "Uh, no."
"Watch the back door. Tell me if you see them coming." Carl ignored her.
"I'm not staying."
"You're not going anywhere." Carl fought. "Sit down. You're helping us protect Judith. They're not getting inside this house. We're not gonna let them."
As if on cue, Judith began to loudly sob.
JJ and Carl looked to each other in confusion. "I thought you just gave her a bottle?"
"I did." Carl assured his aunt.
The two listened closer, hearing footsteps upstairs.
"My window. It's never fully locked." Carl realized.
"Shit." JJ panicked, "You two stay down here."
"No," Carl whispered, "I'm supposed to protect Judith."
"And I'm supposed to protect the both of you. So, you two stay your asses down here."
JJ quickly, but quietly hurried up the stairs to find one of the Wolves in front of Judith. JJ held up her gun, "Step back... now."
The man was in no hurry to move, but JJ wasn't going to risk shooting him that close to Judith. He got closer to Judith when he figured it out, too.
"I think you should step back. Put the gun down, kick it to me. Maybe I let the kid live."
JJ thought through a plan or tried to, at least. She put her gun on the floor but didn't kick it over to the man. Instead, she kicked it toward the closet door, on the opposite side of the room from Judith, in hopes of distracting him.
When he went to reach for it, JJ took her knife and decided that hand to hand combat was the only option. She kept him busy for a few seconds, even causing him to drop his own knife, until he was able to pin her against the door frame.
He held her arms to where she wasn't able to move her upper body, but JJ used her lower half to her advantage. She kneed him in the gut hard enough to where he stumbled backwards and let JJ fall to the floor.
The two then took the fighting into the hall, then to the top of the stairs, where one of them lost their balance, sending them both tumbling down the flight. JJ was able to catch herself before she hit the bottom, unlike the man.
But he quickly got up. He wasn't as fast but he was still fighting and had pinned JJ against the wall. She made eye contact with Carl as she kicked one of the spindles from the staircases' railing out, signaling Carl to catch it and throw it to her.
Once it was in JJ hands, she bashed it against the man's head and drove it into the man's abdomen, piercing through to the wall.
JJ fell to stairs, trying to catch her breath after the brief, but tolling fight.
"Are you okay, J?" Carl asked, walking over to help his aunt up.
She waved him off, "I'm good. So is Judith."
Carl drove his knife into the man's skull so that he wouldn't be able to return.
JJ slowly stood up, sore from the fall, "One of you needs to go upstairs and be a lookout at the window, the other- stay down here."
"Wait, where are you going?" Carl questioned.
JJ was kneeling over the man, stuffing her hair in the bandana he had while wrapping another one around her face to mask herself.
"I'm going to help Carol end this." JJ told him.
Then, she grabbed another pair of boots, put them on, threw on one of Rick's button ups and drew a W on her forehead.
"Do not leave this house. Until I- or someone else- says it's clear. Got it?"
Carl hesitantly nodded, "yeah."
"I'll be back." JJ stated, making sure the front was clear before she eased out.
"Your aunt's kind of a badass." Enid told Carl as they watched JJ leave.
♮♮♮
[JJ]
These men weren't holding back. They were brutal- chopping up the bodies of those they had killed.
I heard shooting and saw two of the wolves chase someone into the armory, so I followed them and took them out from behind. They didn't even know I was there. There was a third one, who quickly ripped the bandana from their face.
"Carol." I breathed. "Thank God."
She gestured, "I guess we had the same idea."
We heard muffled moving from the closet, which Carol quickly opened once she saw I was ready to shoot.
"Please don't kill me!" It was Olivia, holding her hands up in surrender.
"It's okay." Carol calmed. "Anybody else down here?"
I kept my eye on the door, watching out for any more of them.
"Olivia." Carol got her attention.
"No. No, I'm the only one."
Carol walked by me, grabbing a tote bag from the hall and beginning to shove guns into it. "Olivia, come here. Now. You barricade that door behind us once we leave. Do you know how to shoot a gun?" Olivia shook her head. "Stand here. Finger here. Aim there. One of them comes through that door, you squeeze, and you don't stop till they're on the ground."
Carol motioned for us to go, and Olivia slid the door behind us.
"What the hell?" Carol noticed Morgan and Gabriel leaning over one of the captured wolves. She quickly ended him with one shot and handed out guns to the two, not saying another word.
I followed Carol's lead as we went through the community.
Maggie rounded the corner, "Carol? JJ?"
"Maggie!" We waved her over, handing her a gun.
There was a member of the wolves violently dismembering one of our own. Carol went to shoot him, but I stopped her. "I got this one." Carol nodded, letting me.
After a few more shots, everything was over. I ran back home to make sure Carl, Judith and Enid were okay. Carl and Judith were. But Enid...Enid had left, only leaving a note behind.
just survive somehow
I looked out the window and noticed Carol sitting on the steps, debating to smoke a cigarette, so I went out and joined her.
"Why does it seem like it's always us who has to do the hard shit?"
"We know how to fight. We're not afraid to fight." Carol answered, her gaze fixed on the red A stamped in the post. "We're not afraid to kill."
"Is that bad? Not being afraid to kill."
"Not in this world."
"I think we make a good team." I changed the subject.
Carol looked to me, "we do. I gotta admit, you're a lot smarter than I thought you to be."
I halfway smirked, "I'm gonna take that as a compliment."
We sat in a few minutes of silence, horrified at the bodies that littered the streets.
"I almost couldn't protect Judith today." I told her, sighing. I could feel her look of confusion as I looked forward. "He snuck in through the upstairs window... got there just in time."
"You got there in time."
"Yeah, but what if I didn't?" I turned towards her, "What if it was like what happened in the woods? If we had just been a few minutes earlier, there's a good chance Mika could've still been here."
"We weren't. But we were able to stop her before anything happened to Judith." She reminded. "You can't beat yourself up for what happened, JJ. No one could've known. We just have to... move on. Learn from our mistakes."
I looked around, "speaking of, you think that horn from earlier screwed us? It could've drawn those walkers from the quarry."
"They were already carrying out the plan. Maybe they got them far enough out."
"Wait. I thought it was just a dry run?"
"It was supposed to be. It changed." Carol noticed as I got lost in my thoughts. "They had a plan, a good plan. They're gonna be fine. He's gonna be fine."
I rolled my eyes at Carol.
"When he didn't take the gun... I figured he had some reason to stay. Some reason to be a part of this." She told me. "You're good for him."
"I don't know about that."
"Take it from me, you are." I smiled as Carol patted my knee. "Come on, let's go find out who's left of us."
A/N: y'all know the drill