Some Kind of Tomorrow

Mental and physical exhaustion put me to sleep last night faster than I could remember. After what felt like hours of the group as a whole pushing the barn doors shut to keep the walkers out, it just stopped. Everyone finally pulled together, putting their feelings for the world and our situation aside. When it came down to it, when we were actually in danger, we knew we still wanted to live. Not just for ourselves, but for each other.

I remember at one point standing there, I had been squished underneath Daryl's arms with my back to the door. We all used everything we had left in us to keep the dead out. It was like God was on our side for once because eventually, it was like the walkers had just backed off. One after another the weight against the door got lighter until we didn't need to fight to close it anymore. Daryl was the first one there, but the last to leave. And as soon as my body hit the dirt I was out.

I was awoken by the sound of Maggie calling out as she opened the barn door. My eyes adjusted to the morning light. It was well into the morning by now and it looked like everyone else had already been awake for a while.

"Hey… Everyone," Maggie said, her voice sounding cautious. I rubbed my eyes and immediately stood up. I walked out from one of the stall doors to see what was going on. "This is Aaron."

Glenn and Noah immediately raised their weapons as a man walked into the barn following Maggie with Sasha behind him. He wasn't a very big guy, standing about the same height as Maggie. He looked to be in his thirties, wearing a plaid shirt with a raincoat over top. His dirty blond hair was neatly kept and there wasn't a speck of blood or dirt on him. Daryl rushed him, patting him up and down for any weapons he had concealed.

"We met him outside. He's by himself. We took his weapons and we took his gear," she explained. Daryl shut the door behind him after surveying outside for anyone else watching. We all stood and stared at the man. Rick hadn't said a word yet.

"Hi," Aaron greeted, his hands raised in surrender. He flashed a small, welcoming smile. "It's nice to meet you," Aaron stuck his hand out to Rick when no one responded to him. People instantly raised their weapons a little higher and he stopped himself.

"You said he had a weapon?" Rick asked. Maggie handed him Aaron's gun. "Is there something you need?" Rick asked, stashing the gun in the back of his belt.

"He has a camp nearby," Sasha answered. My ears perked up by the sounds of that. "He wants us to audition for membership." My brows furrowed. Audition?

"I wish there was another word. Audition makes it sound like we're some kind of dance troupe," he laughed, "That's only on Friday nights." Everyone was silent, not finding him trying to get in our good graces very entertaining. He shook his head, "Um, and it's not a camp. It's a community,'' he paused, looking away from Rick and around the group at all of us, "I think you all would make valuable additions. But it's not my call. My job is to convince you all to follow me back home." Home? It felt like a lifetime since I heard someone use that word to describe anything in this world. "I know. If I were you, I wouldn't go either-- Not until I knew exactly what I was getting into." He turned his head. "Sasha, can you please hand Rick my pack?" Shasha took off the backpack she was carrying. Rick did not take his eyes off of Aaron. "Front pocket, there's an envelope." Rick opened the bag, pulling out the envelope and Aaron continued to explain. "There's no way I could convince you to come with me just by talking about our community. That's why I brought those. And I apologize in advance for the picture quality--"

"Nobody gives a shit," Daryl cut his babbling off.

Arron actually turned his head to look at him, "You're absolutely 100% right," he answered.

It was strange, you could definitely tell he was timid of us. Yet he still had the balls to walk in here alone to speak with us. Everyone that we came across up to this point, has turned out to be a death sentence. And he did it willingly.

"That's the first picture I wanted to show you," Aaron said and Rick pulled them out of the envelope. I peeked over his shoulder as he knelt on the floor, wanting to see this for myself too. "Nothing I say about our community will matter unless you know you'll be safe." I looked down at the black and white photograph. High-standing walls with thick beams welded into the sides kept the community sheltered. "If you join us, you will be. Each panel in that wall is a 15-foot-high, 12-foot-wide slab of solid steel-framed by cold-rolled steel beams and square tubing." I watched as Rick got back to his feet, cutting off my view of the rest of the pictures. "Nothing alive or dead gets through that without our say-so. Like I said, security is obviously important. In fact, there's only one resource more critical to our community's survival. The people." Rick looked back at those of us standing behind him, I couldn't read his face. I couldn't tell if he was believing Aaron or not. "Together we're strong. You…" Aaron paused again, "Can make us even stronger." Rick then began to walk forwards towards Aaron and my heart began to race. I knew this couldn't be good. "The next picture, you'll see inside the gates--"

I jumped when Rick's fist collided with Arron's jaw, sending the poor man face planting in the dirt. There was no withstanding the force behind it, Aaron was out cold. Rick turned away from him, walking back over to Carl and Judith.

"So we're clear," Michonne grabbed his arm, stopping him. "That look wasn't a 'let's attack this man' look. That was a 'he seems like an okay guy to me' look."

"We gotta secure him," Rick simply answered. "Scar, dump his pack. Let's see what this guy really is," Rick ordered me. I nodded my head, grabbing the brown backpack from the ground and dumping his belongings on the table.

I sifted through the supplies. First, a jar of what looked to be applesauce fell out, then a compass, a flare gun, some utensils, a rope, and a roll of toilet paper.

"Everybody else, we need eyes in every direction. They're coming for us. We might not know how or when, but they are," Rick ordered.

I then dug my hand in the bottom of the bag, my fingers grazing upon something else. I pulled it out, my eyes landing on some more pictures. My brows furrowed as the laminated paper fumbled in my hands. Flipping through them I realized they were all of us. Us walking in a group with the herd of walkers trailing behind us. When we stood in the middle of the road examining the water left for us. Daryl and I, hunting for food and water. A picture of Rosita and me when the rain finally came down. He has been watching us all along.

"Me and Sasha, we didn't see him. If he wanted to hurt us, he could've," Maggie tried to calm Rick down.

"Anybody see anything?" Rick asked, disregarding Maggie.

"Just a lot of places to hide," Glenn answered.

"Rick," I called out, holding the pictures in the palm of my hand, "Maggie's right." Rick walked over at me, taking the images from my hand to look at them himself. "He's been watching us for days without us knowing, he would have done something already."

The only thing Rick seemed to be concerned about was the flare gun. He threw the pictures down on the table, picking up the tiny orange gun.

"That's a hell of a right cross you got there, Rick," Aaron's voice caused me to turn around. He was awake. He lay on his side with his hands now tied behind his back from Daryl's doing. Maggie and Sasha helped him to sit up. He groaned as he tried to stretch out his jaw from the impact. "You're being cautious. I completely understand--"

"How many of your people are out there?" Rick cut him off. "You have a flare gun. You have it to signal your people. How many of them are there?"

Aaron sighed, "Does it matter?"

"Yes. Yes, it does."

"Does it matter how many I say are actually out there? Eight. Thirty-two. Four hundred and forty-four. Zero. It doesn't matter because either way you aren't going to trust me," Aaron fought. He was right, he had us to a tee, or he had Rick to a tee. He wasn't going to trust Aaron no matter what he said. How could he though? After everything, we've gone through.

"Well it's hard to trust anyone who smiles after getting punched in the face," Rick stated.

"How about a guy who leaves water for you on the road?" Aaron confessed. All our heads snapped around to each other. It was him.

"How long you people been following us?" Daryl asked. I could hear it in his voice that he was angry. Angry that he never saw Aaron coming.

"Long enough to see that you practically ignore a pack of roamers on your trail. Long enough to see that despite a lack of food and water, you never turned on each other," he paused, looking around at someone to believe him, "You're survivors and you're people. Like I said, and I hope you won't punch me for saying it again, that is the most important resource in the world."

I looked over at Rick after taking in what Aaron had said. Rick stood still, eyeing down Aaron before he finally stepped closer to where he sat. He was slow and clear when asking, "How many others are out there?"

"One," Aaron answered honestly. Rick shook his head. "I knew you wouldn't believe me," he sighed again. Aaron was persuasive, you could see that in him. But now he faced probably one of his biggest challenges, Rick. "If it's not words, if it's not pictures, what would it take to convince you that this is for real?" he asked. 'Not asking Rick' I said to myself. "What if I drove you to the community? All of you? We leave now, we'll get there by lunch." Aaron offered up a solution.

"I'm not sure how the seventeen of us are going to fit in the car you and your one friend drove down here in," Rick fought, still not believing him.

"We drove separately. If we found a group, we wanted to be able to bring them all home. There's enough room for all of us."

I had to give it to Rick for being weary, Aaron seemed to have an answer for everything he threw his way. It almost sounded staged, a little too good to be true.

"And you're parked just a couple of miles away, right?" Carol asked, picking up on what I was thinking.

"East on Ridge Road, just after you hit Route 16," Aaron answered. "We wanted to get them closer, but then the storm came, blocking the road. We couldn't clear it."

"Yeah, you've really thought this through."

"Rick, if I wanted to ambush you, I'd do it here. You know, light the barn on fire while you slept, pick you off as you ran out the only exit," Aaron stuttered, becoming flustered, "You can trust me."

"Trust doesn't come that easy these days," I spoke up for the first time. I then looked at Rick, "Least we can do is check out the cars--"

"There aren't any cars."

"There's only one way to find out."

"We don't need to find out--"

"We do," I cut him off, making this call for him. This could be a setup or just another dead end, but we owe it to ourselves to at least try. We'd regret it every day if we didn't. This is what we were searching for anyways right? Someplace to call home. "You know what you know, and you're sure of it. But I'm not."

"Me neither," Maggie backed me up.

Rick shook his head, "Your way's dangerous, mine isn't."

"Passing up someplace where we can live? A place we can finally call home? That's pretty dangerous. We need to find out what this is. We need to have some kind of a future. You know we can handle ourselves," I paused looking around at everyone. Even though some looked skeptical, others scared, they all looked like they were willing to at least try. "So that's what we're gonna do."

"I'll go with her," Glenn said, agreeing.

"Me too," Michonne nodded.

Rick sighed, frustrated but understanding, "Abraham!" he called out, turning his head around.

"Yeah. I'll walk with them," he nodded, picking up his machine gun and gearing up to go.

It was settled, I settled it. We were finding out the truth about this place one way or another, only this time it was my ass on the line for making the call.