Poker Face

Chapter 35 - Pickup Day

"Negan tell you anything about the Kingdom?" Simon asked Aven, who was sitting in the passenger's seat of his car as they drove along a long, open plane.

"Yeah but based on what he told me, I'm sure I'm not prepared," she replied, causing Simon to let out a small chuckle.

"Yeah, Ezekiel's...a character," he said. "They say he keeps a fucking tiger but I think that's just talk."

"Keeps a tiger as in...has a tiger sitting around?" she gawked. "Like, orange-black-stripes-giant-cat tiger?" Simon nodded, keeping his eyes on the road. "Yeah, that's bullshit."

"We're actually meeting them about a mile out of the community, right up there," Simon said, pointing to an abandoned lot in the distance. "So we don't get to find out." A few minutes later, they pulled into the lot and waited for the other cars to come to a stop before hopping out. Already waiting were a group of soldiers in bulletproof vests, headed by a heavily dread-locked man in a long, black trench coat and fingerless leather gloves.

"We can hang back," Simon said, coming around to the front of his truck with Aven as the Saviors who had been sitting in the back seat got out to meet the other men. "Gavin and his men are usually the ones dealing with Ezekiel but we have a big haul today so we needed extra hands."

"What are we taking?" Aven asked, unable to see the inside of the truck being presented by the Kingdom.

"Pigs."

"Nice," Aven replied with a small smile. "That's awesome, it's like society's really coming back together."

"What do you mean?" Simon asked.

"I don't know, trading with other established communities, getting fresh meat and eating full meals in a cafeteria..." Aven trailed off for a moment, shaking her head. "It's amazing. I wish I could have seen how Negan did it." Simon narrowed his eyes at her but nodded thoughtfully, still unsure what to make of her.

"Big man's building something really great here," he agreed. "That doesn't happen without absolute cooperation."

"I don't think anyone but Negan could get that from people," she replied, keeping her voice level so as not to sound like she was actively trying to convince him of anything. "I almost feel bad for the poor assholes who defy him...but not really, y'know?"

"I can see why Negan likes you," Simon said. "Although you do give him an awful lot of lip. I can't say that's a great idea."

"I only do it because he knows I don't mean it," she replied. "You know if he thought for a second that I was actually disrespecting him, I'd have been dead a week and a half ago at the latest." Simon chuckled again, still watching the nearby Saviors as they began loading the pigs into their trucks.

"You know, it was really surprising to all of us when he got rid of his wives for you," he said after a long moment in thought, clearly trying to goad information out of her.

"Yeah, that won't last," she replied immediately but not contemptuously.

"And you're okay with that?" Simon asked, cocking an eyebrow at her.

"He's only human," she shrugged. "He doesn't belong to me." She didn't think Negan would really reinstate his wive's club but she couldn't say it wasn't something she never worried about. With Simon questioning her about it, she wondered how much of an effect the harem had on the Saviors' perceptions of Negan.

"But you belong to him," Simon argued, assuming correctly that she didn't want to be claimed in that way.

"We all do," she replied indifferently. "Safety takes loyalty." Just then, Jared came around the truck next to them, raising his voice at one of the soldiers from the Kingdom who remained stoic as he watched the Saviors load their take.