[TWD x Resident Evil] — Chapter 771 - Looting a Burning House

On the other side, Negan hoisted the barbed-wire baseball bat onto his shoulder, that wildly exaggerated grin splitting his face from ear to ear, and sauntered toward Jesus.

Jesus said nothing. He just quietly moved his hand away from the knife at his hip.

He was a smart man.

He understood exactly what was happening: dozens of gun muzzles trained on him, black and unblinking. Any unnecessary movement and they'd shred him to pieces before he hit the ground.

And these people were positioned with a precision that told you everything, every exit on both sides of the highway sealed off, every angle covered. This was no ordinary rabble.

Inside the school bus, Deanna Monroe drew a slow breath, leaning on Aaron's arm, and made herself walk down the steps with something like composure.

Jessie Anderson followed behind her. So did several other survivors, every face white with terror.

"Who are you?"

Deanna Monroe stared at this man radiating something deeply, viscerally dangerous. Her voice trembled.

Negan stopped. Tilted his head. Looked her over.

"You're the one running this bunch?"

"I'm Negan."

He extended a leather-gloved finger and tapped it toward Deanna Monroe, then swept it toward the others still huddled inside the bus.

"From this moment on — all of you. Every piece of clothing on your backs. Every gun. Every scrap of food."

The grin dropped off his face like a mask falling.

"Even the shit you take belongs to me now."

Deanna Monroe, former leader of the Alexandria Safe-Zone, felt the instinct kick in immediately. Negotiate.

"We just lived through a disaster. Our camp is gone. We don't have anything extra to give you."

"Oh, no no no." Negan wagged his finger.

"I can see just fine. You were carrying plenty of good things when you came running out of there."

He used the bat to point at the brand-new assault rifle on Aaron's back, then glanced over at the modified muscle car Jesus had left parked on the shoulder.

"Now. All your weapons. Every single one. On the ground."

"Then get on your knees and swear loyalty to me."

Deanna Monroe bit down hard on her lip.

"I refuse."

She held Negan's eyes without flinching.

"If we hand over all our weapons and you decide you want to do something else to us afterward, we won't even have a chance to fight back."

She knew the rules of this world now. She'd learned them the hard way.

Lose your weapons, and you've handed someone else your life.

These people scared her more than the Walkers.

Jesus looked at Negan and laughed, a short, cold sound.

"Hiding up on that hillside, watching those things swarm over living people. Didn't make a sound."

"Then the moment I lured them off, you come sprinting out to loot the place."

"Shameless."

Negan didn't get angry. He threw his head back and laughed, loud, theatrical, delighted.

He turned and looked back at the crowd behind him.

"Simon. This kid just called us shameless."

From within the crowd, a man stepped forward. Thick handlebar mustache. Eyes cold and mean as a snake's.

Simon. The Saviors' number two.

Inside the organization they called him Negan's executioner, and they meant it literally. Brutal methods, no ceiling on the violence. He handled external operations and crushed any camp that dared push back. The number of people who'd died at his hands was beyond counting.

Simon chewed his gum and walked up to stand in front of Deanna Monroe and Jesus.

"You think you walk away from here in one piece without giving up your weapons?"

He let out a cold laugh, reached out, and pointed back at the hillside behind them.

"Open your eyes. Take a real look."

And with that gesture,

From the tree line on the hillside. From the tall grass. From everywhere at once.

A sudden rush of movement.

Another 100-plus people rose to their feet.

A wall of them. Black and dense, every single one holding a weapon, rifles, handguns, everything.

And at the very top, on the bed of a pickup truck parked at the crest, a heavy machine gun sat mounted on its frame, its black muzzle aimed straight at the school bus.

The survivors sucked in a collective breath.

They'd thought there were a few dozen people. They hadn't imagined this. The sheer scale of it was crushing.

That kind of firepower wouldn't just stop a group of ragged survivors. It would send a proper military company running.

"You had no idea how many of us there really are."

Simon reached out and patted Deanna Monroe on her pale cheek. He wasn't even trying to hide the contempt.

"So. Still think you have any standing to negotiate?"

Despair moved through the survivors like a tide.

Jessie Anderson pulled her youngest son tight against her chest. No one spoke.

In that suffocating silence,

A figure shoved through the crowd from behind.

"I want to join you!"

The voice was raw with hatred. It hit the highway like a thrown stone.

Everyone froze. Then turned.

Ron Anderson.

Jessie Anderson's older son.

His eyes were red and burning, locked on Negan with everything he had.

Jessie Anderson went blank.

She couldn't process what she'd just heard. She grabbed his arm.

"Ron! Have you lost your mind? What are you saying!"

She tried to drag him back. Her hands were frantic.

"Let go of me!"

Ron Anderson wrenched free of her grip like a cornered animal, and spun around. His arm shot out, one finger leveled straight at Deanna Monroe's face.

"She's a murderer!"

"She pulled the trigger herself and killed my father!"

"This woman blew his head apart without a second thought!"

The expression on his face had gone somewhere past anger. It was venomous. It was festering.

Every day back in Alexandria he had watched Deanna Monroe walk past, and every day the same thought had lived in him like something with teeth.

"Why the hell should I die standing next to her?"

"I want to join you! I want to watch her die!"

Negan looked at this furious kid, and something lit up in his eyes.

God, he loved this type. The easy ones. The little firebrands burning themselves hollow on their own rage.

"Ho."

Negan let out a sharp, satisfied whistle and crossed the distance to Ron Anderson in a few long strides. That thick arm swung out and pulled the boy in close by the shoulder.

"I like smart people."

Negan grinned at him, teeth and all.

"In this shit world, the only ones who last are the ones who can read the room. Like you."

He turned his head toward Deanna Monroe and the rest of the survivors and raised his voice.

"Listen up!"

"From this day forward — this young man right here is your new leader!"

The survivors stared at each other. The shock on their faces had no bottom.

Jessie Anderson covered her mouth. Tears ran down without stopping.

She couldn't make it real in her mind. Her son. Her own son, in this moment, turning his back on every single one of them and stepping across to the other side.

Negan gave Ron Anderson a solid pat on the shoulder.

"But, kid."

"We Saviors have one rule."

He lifted the barbed-wire bat off his shoulder and brought it down to his hands.

His fingers moved along the wire slowly, tenderly, the way you'd touch a lover's skin.

"Her name is Lucille. She's a vampire. And right now she's very thirsty."

He held Lucille out to Ron Anderson.

"Every time we meet a new group, or bring someone new into the fold — there has to be blood."

"That's how you set the rules."

"It's also how you make sure people fall in line going forward. How you shut down disagreement before it starts."

He let go and pressed the bat into Ron Anderson's hands.

Ron Anderson held it in both hands. The dried blood on the wood was dark, almost black. His grip was shaking.

Negan stepped back one pace. The smile was gone.

"Go on, kid."

"Pick 2 people out of that group."

"And beat their skulls in with that bat."

He nodded toward Deanna Monroe and the survivors.

"Prove to me you actually want this."

"Prove you're not just a kid who cries."

Ron Anderson stared at the people in front of him.

These were his neighbors. People he'd grown up around. And there was his mother, shaking and weeping, barely holding herself together.

His gaze moved, and settled on Deanna Monroe.

Deanna Monroe looked back at him. There was no anger in her eyes.

Only a deep, quiet sorrow.

"Ron..."

Jessie Anderson screamed it, already lunging forward, and 2 Saviors caught her and slammed her down, boots pinning her to the asphalt.

Ron Anderson set his jaw. He didn't look at her.

But he couldn't stop seeing it. His father's death, playing on a loop behind his eyes. The way it had happened. What was left after.

In a world with no law, the only thing that kept you alive was power.

He didn't want to die.

He wanted blood.

Ron Anderson pulled in a slow breath, and whatever was left of the boy in his face went cold.

He dragged the heavy bat behind him and walked toward Deanna Monroe, one step at a time.

Aaron threw himself in front of her, eyes burning.

"Get out of the way!" Ron Anderson swung the bat up, aligning it with Aaron's skull.

"Aaron. Let him through."

Deanna Monroe put a hand on Aaron's arm and pushed him aside. She stood in front of Ron Anderson herself. Open. Unguarded.

"If my dying is what it takes to bring you back to yourself, Ron — then do it."

The composure in her voice detonated something behind his eyes.

"You think I won't?"

Ron Anderson raised the baseball bat high.

➤ Next: Ron Has Lost His Mind