Fix You ! Cegan

XXXII

It was an elderly woman named Marie who found him. Really, she wasn't known as Marie, but rather #52. But when she happened upon him in the north stairwell he was dazed, and didn't speak to her. In fact he made no indication he was aware she was there at all.

"You're Carl- right?" she spoke softly when she first saw him, in a sweet voice the way a grandmother would speak to their youngest. Nothing. He gave her nothing, so she kept prodding to see if he would respond. After a few minutes she realized it was no use, and she headed off to find whoever she could. This happened to be Sherry, who panicked slightly especially after seeing the state Carl was in when he handed off Judith.

It only took her a few minutes to track down Negan, who was seemingly oblivious to the fact that Carl was missing since he had been busy with the alarms, and Marie led them to him in the stairwell. As soon as Negan saw him, he knew it wasn't going to end well. Carl was sitting against the wall a few steps up, and was staring straight ahead with a rather vacant look in his eyes.

"Hey, you." Negan said while crouching down next to him. He'd expected to find Carl in a highly panicked state after what he had witnessed from him before he left the room followed by his mysterious disappearance. But this...this was something entirely different. He had no idea what to do next, only that it was probably in everyone's best interest to treat the kid like an EOD that could go off at any unpredictable moment, because that's essentially what he was at this point.

He sat there for a minute, mulling over exactly what to do.

"Carl." He reached his hand out cautiously and placed it on the boys forearm. Carl didn't react immediately, so he ran his thumb over his wrist lightly, but still nothing. He didn't want to push things, but he also didn't want to sit on a concrete stairwell floor all day nursing a bullet wound because, well, he was old with a real bad back and the less than comfortable surroundings sure as hell weren't going to help Carl calm down.

"C'mon kid, let's get back to your sis, okay?" he said softly, moving towards him to see if he could finally snap him out of it, and to Negans surprise it worked.

Carls eye met Negans and the look was enough to make the man physically draw his hand back. He inhaled sharply and looked back at the boy, trying to recognize what he was seeing in the kid but it was unfamiliar territory. He hadn't even looked at him like this tha first night in the line up.

Carl suddenly shot back away from him like Negan had electrocuted him and moved up a stair. Negan held his hands up in surrender.

"Hey." he said softly, slightly relieved that at least Carl was seemingly back in this world.

Carl just glared back at him with that fucking l ook, and Negan was torn between simultaneously wanting to slap it off of him as hard as he could while also wanting to grab the kid in his arms and carry him upstairs to their bed. So instead, he just sat there like an asshat and waited until Carl made the next move.

He saw Carl look around finally, his lone eye traveling up and down the stairwell.

"Where am I?" Carl asked softly, his voice unsure.

"Northeast stairwell." Negan shrugged but felt relief that he had finally at least said something. "And no, I don't know how you got here. Nice old lady found you here camped out. C'mon baby, let's get you back to our room, okay?"

At that Carl looked at him like Negan had magically grown his missing eyeball smack dab in the middle of his forehead and moved up one more step away from him, swallowing hard, his breathing suddenly significantly increasing as he looked down at the man.

"What's going on with you, kid?" Negan pushed, thoroughly confused, and he couldn't help but move towards him.

"Get the fuck away from me." Carl spat out towards him, and Negan recoiled instantly. Carl looked back suddenly over his shoulder, and Negan followed his view. He was checking to see what was behind him, and Negan knew it was a locked door at the top of the stairwell. Carl of course had no way of knowing it was locked, and in an instant had made his decision.