damnation → the walking dead ⁴

[ 001 ] the day will come when you won't be.

— CHAPTER ONE.
the day will come when you won't be.

IF SHE'S GOING TO feel like this for the rest of her life, she doesn't want to keep living. She knows Death. They've known each other for a long time now. Death has knocked on her door many times and yet she always outruns Death. But this time she isn't so sure.

She's lost people before. She's watched people she loved die. But knowing... anticipating the brutal death of someone you love... it's whole other thing. Someone in this clearing is going to die tonight. It isn't going to be any of the Saviors standing around. It's going to be one of these people on their knees in the gravel.

And though they don't know who will lose these life tonight, they're all equally scared. Some are scared for themselves, some are scared for each other.

Odessa Grimes doesn't fear for her life anymore. She hasn't for a long time now. Instead, she is petrified for her father and her baby brother. She's scared for every person in this lineup.

Negan has turned it into a game. He has taken their lives right from their bodies and dangles them right in front of these faces. Their fate is quite literally in this monster's hands.

Maybe Odessa feels too alive right now. Or maybe she isn't anything more than a dead girl. She hopes it's her. In an odd sense, it would bring her peace if she knew it would be her that took one for the team. It would comfort her to know her life was taken so her family could live. It's sick and twisted. But it would mean more to Odessa than anything before.

Every time the bat is pointed at Rick or Carl, Odessa grows angrier. She grows more scared. All she wants to do is hit Negan. She wants to kill him. Yet, she knows it would get her and everyone else killed.

By the time Negan reaches "you are" he stands between Rick and Theo. His bat remains pointed at her father. Odessa is terrified. She's scared for her father and her big brother right now.

Theo looks at Odessa. He can't look at Cole right now. Cole can't watch him die. He's already lost everyone. He knows Cole desperately wants this to stop. He can't lose Theo. Not when their last conversation was a screaming match. And it was over something Theo had been right about.

But at the very last second, Negan swings his bat in the direction of Abraham Ford.

"It." Negan smirks.

The man stands tall. He doesn't waver. His eyes are hard, never showing this monster of a human fear. Abraham has always been brave. Perhaps the bravest of them all. He thinks the same thing Odessa had. If he takes one for the team maybe it wouldn't be so hard. Abraham isn't scared.

Sasha and Rosita are. Both woman have tears falling. They can't seem to stop them. They don't even try. The man they love is about to die.

Rosita gasps, her body trembles. Abraham saved her life... right at the start. He looked at her in a way no man ever had. And from then on they needed each other.

Sasha lets out a soft sob. She wobbles on her knees. She stares at Abraham. She's lost everyone. Bob, Tyreese, and now Abraham. It isn't fair.

Negan is smiling. He takes some sick pleasure in this. He's demented and he's sick. He's smiling.

And Kathleen Cooper watches the scene unfold with an odd sense of pleasure. She stands back, her arms crossed in her leather jacket.