Future Ghosts • TWD

88. No Exceptions.

They thought their plan would work. They thought Eugene would distract the Saviors and they would get Maggie to the doctor at Hilltop on foot. It was working. It really was working. Until it wasn't. Whistles rang out from around them. They all looked around, frantically trying to find the source of the sound, but it was coming from all over. Rosie caught a glimpse of some shadows in the trees. They were surrounded.

"Go! Go!" Rick shouted.

The group picked up their pace, but they couldn't run as fast as they wanted with Maggie on that cot. They couldn't leave her either. As they ran through the forest, Rosie, Carl, and Ian leading the way with their weapons raised, the whistles only seemed to get louder. They reminded Rosie of the whistles she used to hear from birds on early spring mornings; the chickadees outside her window singing spring's here! Except these whistles were lower and gave her no comfort whatsoever. She was scared out of her mind.

When the group ran out into a small clearing in the woods, they were suddenly blinded by bright, yellow lights, stopping them in their tracks. Rosie squinted her eyes, looking over to Rick for any sort of command or direction, but he gave none. The few whistles from before erupted into even louder whistles from all around them. They were completely surrounded. People appeared from the trees, leaving the group with nowhere to run. Rosie spun around, taking in her surroundings. The RV was there with Eugene kneeling on the ground in front of it. The bright light from before came from car headlights. Each and every person around them had a weapon. There was no escaping this. There were too many of them.

The whistling came to an abrupt halt and a man with brown, graying hair started to speak. It was the same man who was at the front of the first roadblock. Rosie was pretty sure that he was in charge. "Good. You made it," he said. The sadistic smile on his face made Rosie want to run away and hide, but she couldn't. She had to be brave, and she had to be tough. "Welcome to where you're going. We'll take your weapons," the man said. Rosie looked to Rick again for guidance, and no one made any move to hand over their weapons. Then the man pulled out a gun and pointed it directly at Ian, seeing as he was the smallest- aside from Rosie, that is. But if Rosie really was Rosie, the man couldn't shoot her. He'd be killed for that. "Now," he said.

Rick tried to catch his breath, staring at the weapon and then at the kid in front of it. "We can talk about it," he tried.

"We're done talkin'. Time to listen," the man said. His eyes were wide with some sort of evil spark inside of them. Rosie froze in her spot when a man appeared behind her, gripping her arm harshly. Her heart beat fast as he slightly lifted up the bottom of her shirt and took each and every weapon from her belt. Her gun: gone. Her hunting knife: gone. Hell, even her puny pocket knife: gone.

The main man himself took Carl's weapon, and Carl only glared at him, his eyes squinted with rage. "That's yours, right?" the man asked. Carl gave no answer. The man leaned in closer with a smile. "Yeah, it's yours."

After flicking Carl's hat, the man stood up tall again. "Okay," he looked over to Maggie on the cot, "Let's get her down and get you all on your knees. Lots to cover." Abraham, Aaron, Sasha, and Rick lowered the cot to the ground and helped Maggie off of it while Rosie, Carl, and Ian stood to the side, unsure of what to do. As Rick and Abraham helped Maggie to her knees, one of the Saviors dragged Eugene over to them. "Gonna need ya on your knees," the man demanded, standing tall in front of Rick. Rick hesitated, taking in his surroundings. His eyes landed on the kids. Carl and Ian were looking right back at him, their eyes wide and afraid, while Rosie was staring at the dirt, looking like she wasn't even really there.

Rick looked back at the man and slowly lowered himself to his knees, followed by Sasha, Aaron, Ian, Abraham, and Carl. Rosie didn't want to. The last thing she wanted to do was to kneel down to these bastards. She looked over to Rick, her leader, and he was looking back at her with pleading eyes. Despite the fury erupting inside of her, Rosie put aside her dignity and dropped herself to the ground.