Changing To Adapt ➵ TWD

➵ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴇɪɢʜᴛᴇᴇɴ

"Should we knock? I mean, people live here."

T-Dog glances up at Glenn and deadpans, "I think we're way past that."

"We have to take back some sense of normality when we can though. Right?" Lucas stops at the bottom of the steps.

No one says anything.

"I'll just knock." Lucas decides, almost tripping when they finally meander up the steps to the large farmhouse they'd been directed to.

It's a nice place, the working lights warm on their skin and calm on their eyes. There's a generator nearby, but the large stretch of land reaches so far that noise, though it should be moderated at all times these days, isn't the biggest issue.

"Did you close the gate up the road on your way in?"

Lucas flinches, bumps into Glenn and almost falls over when a dizzy spell hits him. Holding himself up by the house pillar, his eyes latch onto the lone figure camped out on a chair by the porch. 

It's the same girl that took Lori.

Glenn clutches at the shotgun in his hands, tilting it away in a non-aggressive action, "Uh, hi. Yes, we closed it. Did the latch and everything."

The girl remains quiet but leans forward in her chair.

Lucas clears his throat, glancing pointedly at Glenn to keep talking.

"We, uh, met before briefly."

"Would've been a home run," Lucas says, his mouth moving of its own volition when he gestures to the bat at her feet. Still, he adds, "if the walker had actually died." 

She tilts her head, raising a solid eyebrow.

T-Dog nudges Lucas as harshly as he can, then lowers his eyes to meet the woman's gaze. "Look, we came to help. There anything we can do?"

She stands up, looking immediately at the line of red seeping through T-Dog's bandages.

"It's not a bite." T-Dog reassures, "Though I cut myself pretty bad."

Finally, she caves. She lets them inside, introduces herself as Maggie, and even offers them some food. So far so good. But that's what Lucas thought about the C.D.C too. He remains cautious, can't bear to look at a pale and scarily still Carl lying on the bed, can't even look a devastated Rick in the eyes.

Lucas slumps down against one of the walls, legs stretched out, watching T-Dog get stitches.

His eyes flutter.

These people almost remind him of before. Clean, innocent, confused.

The sirens ran through every class and hallway like a bad omen. For once, the whole school was quiet in the wake of the noise.

"That's not the fire alarm," Kaine whispered.

Lucas looked up at him.

Their eyes locked in a mutual understanding.

Rachel Thomas didn't have an answer for her students. She opened her mouth, trying to form words. But none came.

Past the confusion clouding the room in a thick haze, they heard something else. A shrill whistle, like a jet soaring through the sky, and a clap of thunder not moments after.

The class went still.

It wasn't thunder.

No, an explosion. Like one you'd feel shake the floors in the cinema, but muffled. Further off.