𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝟑. carl grimes

14 - OCEANSIDE

Michonne hands me a machine gun, a fully loaded one, before she moves on and gives out our other people some more guns. We're going to this group called Oceanside. Tara said they have an armory and a lot of guns. Oceanside's hidden but Tara knows where they are, she came across them during her run with Heath. The latter is missing and haven't found for weeks now, we don't know where to look and we're too occupied by preparing for a war.

Carl is talking to Rick and everyone else seeme busy, except for a bothered-looking Tara who's sat on the porch steps. She sees me approaching her and gives off a smile, before I take a seat next to her and placed the gun beside me.

"You alright?" I asked as I looked at her.

"I just feel a little bad." Tara confesses, me listening to her. "I made a promise to a girl there, her name's Cyndie. I promised I won't tell anyone about Oceanside." Now I get why she looks kind of bothered. Tara's not the one who's likely to break promises. "She saved my life, more than once."

Whoever this Cyndie girl is, I already have respect for her for saving my friend's life.

"The Saviors killed all their men," Tara tells me and my eyes narrowed. "That's why they're hidden. They were supposed to work for Negan, but they got away. That's why she made me promise not to tell anybody where they are."

I put my hand on Tara's shoulder, giving it a squeeze. "Yeah, she'll be pissed, but I think she'll understand." I reassured her. "They know what it's like being in Negan's grasp, they'll understand why we're doing this. They have to."

"I hope so." Tara mutters, looking down.

"Best case scenario, they join us in fighting Negan." I said, hoping that'll happen. We already have the Scavengers with us, getting more guns for them will make them fully in our side.

But, I can't shake this odd feeling off about them. I usually get this feeling whenever a person is a traitor, but maybe I'm just too skeptical because we've trusted so many damn people and they ended up betraying us.

Rick calls everyone that's going and Tara and I stand up, running towards the car. I give Enid a quick nod before we enter the car along with Carl and Gabriel. Rick is driving and Michonne is next to him, sat in the trunk are Daryl, Jesus and Tara. We're all armed and ready to fight. I go through the plan again.

We'll plant a few bombs from outside Oceanside. Tara will go and talk to the leader named Natania, if her ten minutes are up and she doesn't give any signal, the bombs will go off. Rick and the others will gather the people of Oceanside while Michonne and I stay on separate trees because we're both chosen to be lookouts. We'll wait for any signal if we have to kill anybody.

Somehow the plan of having to kill somebody doesn't bother me as much as before. After Negan killed Glenn and Abraham, I'm not afraid to kill anymore. I guess it's not only lives of the loved ones Negan took from me, he also took the fear of killing people from me. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but I guess it's both.

It took a while before we stopped by the woods, Tara says we have to go on foot now. We go through the woods, planting the bombs to where Tara instructs us to, before it's time to get in position. Michonne and I stood in front of trees with Rick, Enid and Carl behind us. As Rick talks to Michonne as she climbs up, I sighed and just shrugged.

"You don't know how to climb a tree, do you?" I heard Enid's playful voice behind me and I turned to her.

"I'll learn." I rolled my eyes after seeing Carl and Enid crack up amused smile.

"I'll help you." Carl offers and I let him.

I started climbing a tree, Enid instructing on what I should do as Carl boosts me up. One of his hands found my butt and my eyes widen, before I looked down at Carl who's cheeks are red. He retrieves his hand quickly as I hear Enid snickering.

"Enid, I swear to god..." I trailed off, making her snicker even more. She tells me she's gonna go check on the others before leaving along with Rick. Michonne is already done climbing her tree. I turned my attention back to Carl. "Watch your hand."

"S-Sorry." Carl stutters before I start climbing up again.

I sighed. "Also, stop looking at my ass, Carl."

I can feel him blushing in embarrassment and I shook my head with an amused smile. It takes a few seconds before I reached Michonne's level, giving a thumbs up to Carl below. He salutes before going back to the others.

"Now we wait." Michonne said and I nod, getting my gun in position and holding onto the tree, making sure I don't fall. Silence falls between Michonne and I, until she decided to break it. "By the way, I saw that hickey on Carl's neck."

I waited for something like this to happen. "And..?"

I can sense Michonne smirking. "I wouldn't be surprised if you're carrying Carl Jr. already."

My eyes widened before I looked at Michonne, cheeks red as hell and she laughs. I shook my head, not making another comment.

I keep count in my head and when ten minutes are done, the bombs go off. A few more bombs go off before Michonne and I see a large group of women, us aiming our guns at them as Carl and the others round them up. Rick started talking to them, before Tara comes with a grown lady, I assume she's Natania, and a girl behind them. She must be Cyndie.

Tara looks up at us when she sees us. "Farren, Michonne, don't!"

Michonne and I glanced at each other before looking back at them. They talk, Natania still has a gun on Tara. Cyndie talks to Natania, it looks like she's trying to convince her to join us.

"Farren," Michonne calls to me and I turn to her. She nods to a direction and I look, seeing walkers coming towards where Carl and the others are. "Rick, walkers!"

Cyndie knocks Natania down, taking me and everybody in surprise. I don't dwell on it too much and focused back on the walkers, before gunshots went off. I shoot as best as I can. I know I'm still not good with big guns, but I think I'm getting the hang of it. I focused on a walker and tried to shoot it in the head, instead I'm shooting it by its shoulder and anywhere else, but its head. I sighed in frustration before getting my switchblade out, holding the blade, before throwing it at the walker. It falls to the groud dead, before I go back to using the machine gun.

Breathe, Farren, breathe. You can do this. I can hear my subconscious masked in Carl's voice tell me, and I do exactly that.

I aimed before I breathe in, pulled the trigger, exhaled and I saw a walker I shot fall to the ground. I shoot a few more before they're all dead. I looked back at Rick and the others, seeing the latter shake a woman's hand, but Natania walks out.

I looked at Michonne as I pant. "I think we got ourselves a deal."

— later

We have a lot of guns loaded up in the RV and at the other car. The Oceanside refused to fight with us, but they let us have their guns to fight for them. I guess the Saviors killing all their men took a real big piece from them. They're too traumatized to fight and stand up. I get it though, but I'm doing this for my family. For the ones I've lost. But most importantly, I'm doing this for myself.

The gates of Alexandria were opened by Rosita. She went to Hilltop the day Carl and I got back from our run. Now she's back. I got out of the car immediately and pulled her into a hug. She hugs back and we pull away as everyone else approaches.

"Hey, are you okay?" Enid asked Rosita once she's in front of her.

"Where's Sasha?" Jesus asked immediately.

She doesn't answer the question. "There's someone here."

The look on her face doesn't give any trace of excitement or whatsoever. So I immediately know that that "someone" isn't our friend or ally. I wonder who it is, but I don't follow them and just helped unloading the cars.