TWD - Chapter 505: The Return (Patreon)

Before dawn the next morning, Sasha’s team slipped quietly out of Alexandria as if escaping an awkward social gathering.

Once they were well away, Zach, who had been holding it in the entire trip, finally burst out laughing and slapped his thigh.

“Hahaha! ‘Talk like civilized people!’ And that ‘sincere invitation’!

“Did you see that guy’s face? He sounded like he was reading a speech. It was disgusting!”

Boone dramatically rolled down the window and took a deep breath of the “free” air outside.

“Finally! If we’d stayed any longer, I’d have had to learn which fork you’re supposed to use for salad.”

Tyreese shook his head with a wry smile as he drove.

“Typical people who’ve never gone hungry, never been chased by walkers, never had to fight raiders for their lives.

“Deanna protected them too well. So well that... well, there’s basically a layer of bulletproof glass between their brains and reality.”

Noah stared out at the desolate Virginia landscape.

“They have no idea what a luxury it is to be safe enough to criticize other people for not being civilized enough.”

Sasha didn’t join in.

Sitting in the passenger seat, she was already thinking about how to word her report.

Alexandria had value.

The clean streets, intact greenhouses, engineers like Reg, and Deanna’s ability to maintain order were all rare treasures in the apocalypse.

But its deep-rooted stubbornness, the leadership’s naivety, and especially those two Monroe stumbling blocks were serious obstacles.

As the leader’s sons, their words carried weight whether they deserved it or not. After this long in the apocalypse, they were still naive and arrogant.

Sooner or later, they were going to cause trouble.

Around noon, the group stopped to rest on high ground with a broad view of the surrounding area.

Tyreese and Boone started fiddling with their precious Eugene-brand relay communicator.

It wasn’t particularly large, but every time they unfolded its antenna, Boone felt like they were trying to contact aliens.

Zach crouched nearby, digging into one of the cans Alexandria had given them.

“Can that thing really reach Rock Fortress?”

Since the apocalypse began, he had never seen equipment capable of communicating over such a long distance.

After an agonizing round of adjustments and repeated “hello, hello” tests, the signal finally connected to Rock Fortress, though it kept cutting in and out.

Sasha methodically reported the camps they had marked along the way, the movements of the mad raiders, and Alexandria’s situation.

When she reached Deanna’s final condition, “unless Ms. Calista comes in person,” the communicator went silent for slightly longer than usual.

Sasha was ready for the response.

She expected Calista to calmly reject such an unrealistic demand, perhaps saying nothing more than, “Understood. Continue with the rest of the reconnaissance mission,” or redirecting them toward a more practical target for cooperation.

Instead, after the brief silence, there was neither a rejection nor a simple acknowledgment.

There was a faint sound.

Almost like an exhale.

The sort of sound someone might make after spending hours hunched over a desk and finally getting the chance to stretch.

Then Calista’s voice came through.

It was as steady as ever, but Sasha could have sworn there was a hint of amusement in it.

Maybe even anticipation.

“Alexandria. Deanna Monroe,” Calista repeated slowly. “She insists on meeting me in person before she’ll consider cooperation... Hah.”

Sasha and Tyreese exchanged a glance.

Both looked equally confused.

That reaction wasn’t what they had expected.

“Sasha, Tyreese, this intelligence is valuable. Good work.”

Calista gave the standard acknowledgment first.

Then her tone shifted slightly.

“As for Deanna’s condition... I’ve been thinking about it.”

What is there to think about?

Sasha almost said it aloud.

“Where are you now? How long would it take you to get back to Alexandria?” Calista asked.

“We’re about sixty miles from Alexandria, heading south. Returning would take... around three or four hours by car.”

The bad feeling in Sasha’s stomach grew stronger.

“Turn around,” Calista said clearly. “Go back to Alexandria.”

“Huh?”

Even Tyreese couldn’t stop the short sound of disbelief.

Boone’s eyes widened as he mouthed, No way.

“Wait, Ms. Calista,” Sasha said, trying to keep the shock out of her voice. “You mean...”

“I mean it’s been a long time since I left Rock Fortress and got some fresh air. Staring at maps and reports all day is getting boring.

“Alexandria sounds like an... interesting place. And I’d like to meet Deanna myself.”

Sasha could actually hear something almost like a complaint from someone who had spent too long trapped behind a desk.

“Besides, the weather’s nice. I should probably... get out and move around a little.”

Move around?

Did she think this was a weekend hike?

Calista paused, and her voice turned colder.

“Joe mentioned earlier that those mad raiders were already operating close to the Georgia border.

“Rather than letting them grow unchecked in the north, we might as well go and ‘introduce ourselves’ before they get any stronger.

“Since they’re so close to Alexandria... maybe we can solve two problems at once.”

Sasha fell silent.

Calista wasn’t merely interested in Alexandria.

She also saw this trip north as an opportunity to strike at a potential threat before it became worse.

But coming personally?

Just because of something Deanna had said?

Just because she was “bored”?

That didn’t match the Calista Sasha knew at all.

Unless Alexandria’s value in Calista’s eyes was far greater than they realized.

Great enough to justify the leader taking the risk herself.

“But Calista, this is too dangerous. It’s a long trip, we still don’t know where Alexandria truly stands, and the mad raiders are moving unpredictably...”

Sasha made one final attempt to talk her out of it.

“That’s why you need to go back first, keep things stable, and tell them I accept the invitation,” Calista interrupted.

“I’ll handle the route and decide who comes with me.

“Your current assignment is to return to Alexandria and inform Deanna that I’ll be there soon.

“Tell her to prepare the table for those ‘equal negotiations.’

“And keep an eye on those raiders while you’re at it. I’d rather not arrive only to find Alexandria already gone.”

...

None of them knew just how valuable Alexandria actually was in Calista’s eyes.

Deanna Monroe, a Democratic congresswoman from Ohio, had been friends with Pamela, the Commonwealth’s pre-apocalypse “First Daughter,” despite the two women being completely different from one another.

Reg Monroe was a top structural engineer and a professor of architecture.

Those two were what Calista truly wanted.

Calista understood better than anyone that Deanna had never been merely a naive idealist.

She knew how to negotiate, knew how to govern, and knew how to bring people together.

Building an orderly community like Alexandria out of the ruins hadn’t been the result of softness. It had taken genuine political ability.

What looked like hesitation on the surface was simply Deanna desperately trying to preserve a basic standard of civilization in the apocalypse.

It wasn’t that she lacked the ability to deal with a crisis.

She simply refused to abandon the order she believed in unless absolutely necessary.

And Reg?

How could the husband of a state legislator possibly be an ordinary structural engineer?

He was a highly skilled specialist in disaster-resistant construction who had worked on major urban infrastructure projects.

Alexandria’s seemingly ordinary wall had actually been designed around the realities of the apocalypse.

Its weakness came from the complacency of the people behind it, not from Reg’s design.

Reg’s approach to infrastructure was exactly what Rock Fortress needed to address its greatest weakness.

They had soldiers.

They had territory.

They could build military-grade defenses.

What they lacked was a top engineer capable of making a mid-sized city like Knoxville sustainable over the long term, someone who could plan not just defenses, but the everyday infrastructure needed for an entire community.

As for “W,” the group’s cruelty and drive to expand in the original storyline were even worse than Sasha had described.

They had played a major role in the devastating losses Alexandria eventually suffered.

And that was precisely where Calista saw her opportunity.

Use the threat of “W” to shake Deanna out of her stubborn certainty.

Make her understand that her abilities shouldn’t be confined to the small world of Alexandria.

Rock Fortress and Knoxville were places where she could truly put those abilities to use.

To everyone else, Deanna’s condition, “unless you come in person,” looked like a problem.

To Calista, it was the perfect opening.

She knew Deanna wasn’t asking for submission.

She wanted to be treated as an equal.

She wanted enough respect and reassurance to feel that she could safely entrust everything she had built to someone else.

Going personally would show Deanna that respect.

It would also give Calista the chance to show her exactly what Rock Fortress was capable of.

Besides, given Calista’s physical condition, staying behind a desk for too long didn’t suit her anyway.

Every now and then, she needed to get back out on the front lines and get herself moving again.