chapter sixteen !
❪ welcome aaron ❫
RILEY HAD FINALLY WOKEN UP. she sat up from her spot and rubbed her eyes. the girl looked around to find carl but he was nowhere to be found. the others seemed exhausted and looked like they didn't get sleep at all.
noah laid his head on the hay with tiring eyes. "why do you all look so tired?" she scooted closer to him with a frown.
"walkers," he simply responded with, "they tried breaking in."
"why didn't you wake me?" riley asked him, eyebrows furrowing.
noah shrugged and stood up. he looked down at riley and grabbed her hand, "come, check it out." the girl stood up and was dragged away from the barn.
when noah opened the shed doors and riley was met with the sun flashing her eyes, she had finally seen the trees that had fallen and the walkers that were crushed.
"oh my god..."
"everything turned out to be okay though, we all held the door closed," noah reassured her.
she sighed and covered her forehead with her hand. "sorry that i didn't help."
"nah it's fine, i didn't want to wake you lovebirds up." the teen had a smirk growing on his face.
"lovebirds? what are you talking–"
riley's sentence was interrupted when they heard someone clear their throat behind them. the two turned around, facing carl.
"oh! carl," she huffed, "i was just about to look for you..."
"yeah, uh, i went with glenn to find some water for the group." he answered with narrowed eyes. "we should head back inside before my dad starts to worry."
riley gave him a small nod and walked back inside the barn with the boys. everyone perked their heads up but their faces rested when they saw it was only them.
that was until maggie and sasha came inside but with a stranger, "everyone... this aaron."
in a second, the whole group raised their guns at the man. he had a plaid flannel on with a warm jacket on top. "we met him outside. he's by himself. we took his weapons and we took his gear."
daryl aggressively started patting down aaron, causing the man to flinch and close his eyes shut.
"hi..." he murmured with raised hands.
judith suddenly started crying before rick handed her over to carl, who began shushing her. "its nice to meet you," he took a step forward and stretched out his hand for rick to shake but stopped when hearing a gun click.
"you said he had a weapon?" rick inquired.
maggie walked towards the grimes and handed him aaron's weapon. "there something you need?"
"he has a camp nearby. he wants us to audition for membership," sasha explained.
"audition?" riley chuckled.
"i wish there was another word. audition makes it sound like we're some kind of a dance troupe. that's only on friday nights."
everyone stood quiet, still glaring at him. "um, it's not a camp. it's a community. i think you all would make valuable additions. but its not my call. my job is to convince you all to follow me back home."
"do you guys eat people?" riley blurted out, causing everyone to whip their heads towards her.
aaron's eyes widened, "god no. we have perfectly healthy and amazing food. animal meat, pasta, chicken, you name it we have it."
the brunette sent a smile to the stranger while rick kept staring him down. "i know. if i were you, i wouldn't go either. not until i knew exactly what i was getting into. sasha, can you hand rick my pack?"
sasha walked over to rick and handed him the backpack. "front pocket, there's an envelope. there's no way i could convince you to come with me just by talking about our community. thats why i brought those. i apologize in advance for the picture quality, we just found an old camera store last–"
"nobody gives a shit." daryl rudely interrupted. riley rolled her eyes and smacked the archers arm, him turning his head at her taken back.
"you're absolutely 100% right," aaron murmured. rick scrolled through the pictures, "that's the first picture i wanted to show you because nothing i say about our community will matter. unless you know you'll be safe. if you join us, you will be."
"each panel in that wall is a 15-foot-hight, 12-foot- wide slab of solid steel framed by cold-rolled steel beams and square tubing. nothing alive or dead gets through that without our say-so."
"like i said, security is obviously important. in fact, theres only one resource more critical to our community's survival. the people. together we're strong. you can make us even stronger."
riley glanced at carl while aaron continued and rick began walking towards him. "the next picture, you'll see inside the gates. our community was first construc–"
suddenly, rick sucker punched aaron that he fell unconscious on the ground. the smith girl flinched at the action and walked towards the body.
"rick, what the hell?"
"we got to secure him. dump his pack. let's see what this guy really is."
"rick." michonne's voice was firm.
"everybody else, we need eyes in every direction. they're coming for us," the man announced. "we might not know how or when but they are."
riley helped maggie with aaron as he woke up a few minutes later. "that's a hell of a right cross there, rick."
"sit him up."
"i think it's better if–"
"it's okay," aaron groaned.
"he's fine, sit him up." rick ordered.
riley and maggie sat the man up. "you're being cautious. i completely understand."
"how many of your people are out there? you have a flare gun. you have it to signal your people. how many of them are there?"
aaron sighed, "does it matter?"
"yes, yes it does."
"i mean, of course, it matters how many people are actually out there, but does it matter how many people i tell you are out there because im pretty sure no matter what number i say–eight, thirty-two, four hundred- forty four, zero, no matter what i say, you're not going to trust me."
"well, its hard to trust anyone who smiled after getting punched in the face." rick tilted his head.
"how about a guy who leaves bottles of water for you in the road?" aaron responded with.
everyone stared at him while rick looked around. "how long you people been following us?"
"long enough to see that you practically ignore all the roamers on your trail. long enough to see that despite a lack of food and water, you never turned on each other." he explained.
"at least someone in the group accepted my help." aaron whipped his head towards riley, who glanced down at his stare. "was the water bad?"
riley stood quiet until she met everyones eyes and shook her head. "no," she murmured, "the water wasn't bad."
"see?"
"you took the water?" rick asked, slightly disappointed at the girl.
"rick, i was dehydrated and have asthma. if we continued walking on the road, i was going to collapse sooner or later." riley told him.
the leader looked down as aaron continued, "you're surviors and you're people. like i said and i hope you wont punch me for saying it again, that is the most important resource in the world."
the group shared looks with each other. "how many others are out there?" rick asked him.
"one." aaron finally answered. "what if i drove you to the community? all of you? we leave now, we'll get there by lunch. "
"i'm not sure how the fifteen of us are going to fit in the car you and your one friend drove down here in."
"we drove separately. if we found a group, we wanted to be able to bring them all home. there's enough room for all of us."
"and you're parked just a couple miles away, right?" carol asked him.
"east on ridge road, just after you hit route 16. we wanted to get them closer but then the storm came, blocked the road, we couldn't clear it."
"yeah, you've really thought this through." rick scoffed.
"rick, if i wanted to ambush you, i'd do it here. you know, light the barn on fire while you slept, pick you off as you ran out the only exit. you can trust me," aaron pleaded.
michonne stepped forward, "i'll check out the cars."
"there aren't any cars," rick stated.
"theres only one way to find out."
"we don't need to find out."
"we do. you know what you know and you're sure of it, but i'm not."
"me neither," maggie agreed.
"your way is dangerous, mine isn't." rick shrugged.
"passing up someplace where we can live? where judith can live? thats pretty dangerous. we need to find out what this is. we can handle ourselves. so that's what were gonna do."
"then i will too." glenn chimed in, "i'll go."
"abrham?"
"yeah. i'll walk with them."
"rosita?"
"okay." she nodded.
"if we're all in here, we're a target. all right, groups of two, find somewhere safe within eyeshot."
riley was the last one out and closed the barn doors shut.
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AUTHORS NOTE:
my fingers hurt from writing aarons boring speeches omgg
this chapter was long and boring but MY FAVORITE ERA IS COMING... RILEYS BANGS!!!
please vote for the next chapter and DONT BE A GHOST READER <3