You Move or You Die

It was a bit shameful to admit, but the only reason I was staying on the Greene farm in most part was because the question remained in my head everyday:

'When was I going to have sex with Maggie again?'

Sure I was nineteen or so and Maggie was hot as hell, our first time incredible, but because of Gamer's Mind, preventing stress from impacting my judgement and Immunity to Mental Disorder, hormones didn't addle my decision making in the slightest. I was sure that for now, the safest plan of action was to remain on the Greene Farm.

Not much happened in the week after Maggie and I fucked in the abandoned convenience store. I helped Otis and Jimmy with chores around the ranch, and became exponentially better at horse back riding and other farm work.

Mostly because of the Gamer, but still.

I actually had to hide how good at farm work the Gamer made me because it frankly was ridiculous. What Jimmy and Otis combined needed an hour or two to do I could complete in around thirty minutes tops on my own.

For that reason, Hershel seemed to trust me a little more as the night's went on, and I felt a little better about what happened between Maggie and I.

However, I started to feel ever more curious from my little spot in the barn about what to do.

I owed Hershel nothing, I earned this spot on the ranch, and the mutual agreement I had with Hershel was favorable to both of us. 

However, around the same time I figured out how to carve a metal engraving of 'Donnie' into a metal tag for Billy-no-more, my Golden Retriever, I realized that I could be doing him a favor by moving his family away from here.

Both Annette and Shawn die before they meet Rick Grimes, sure those characters were fictional in a show, and this was now my actual life. But still, by leaving here with them, I could be doing them all a favor. 

Either way, I closed my eyes to rest, those decisions could wait until tomorrow. 

...

I woke up to an absolutely wonderful feeling and sight.

Maggie Greene was riding my morning wood wearing nothing more than a cowboy hat.

I groaned slightly. "Wha...Maggie?"

"Mornin' tiger." she joked, continuing to bounce slightly on my cock.

Honestly, this was coming for over a week. Maggie had avoided me like the plague for days and I respected her wishes enough to not try to talk to her since.

I lifted my hands, enjoying Maggie's gorgeous ass in my grasp and her curves. This girl was so fucking fit, it was honestly miraculous that this was happening. I was not a virgin, even long before I met Maggie, but still.

"Why wait this long?" I held back a slight moan.

"Oh you know, I felt the longer I waited the more it could be that your balls might wanna explode. Plus, it was fun to see you try to ignore me everywhere I went."

There wasn't one thing about her that wasn't sexy as all hell. Even her voice.

"A-Ah!"

She gasped in surprise when with almost no effort at all I was able to plant her face first in my bed and start to plow the shit out of her.

I noticed Maggie was so dedicated to this bit she had even rolled a condom over me when I was still asleep. I didn't know if that was funny or actually a bit impressive, fuck me.

"O-Oh, fuck me." she begged, when I was able to ram into her as deeply as I could.

I felt that mind erasing 'bump' everytime I swear the tip of my dick rubbed against her cervix. It was addicting, as addictive as her.

I lifted Maggie by the elbow and we continued to rut doggy style. I kissed along her neck, holding her by her right naked breast as we fucked.

I gasped in her ear, gripping her impressive ass and then her hips.

It was a miracle we didn't wake up Donnie, because by the end Maggie was screaming at the top of her lungs into the straw of the barn's second floor.

I quickly pulled out and beat off, then cumming all over Maggie's huge, smooth, and round ass.

...

"Yech."

Maggie's nose wrinkled, she wiped my cum off her back and more or less failed to use the hay around that made up my bed to clean.

Her hat had long since fallen off, and I undressed a little more, we were cuddling up naked beneath the covers. The sun had just begun to rise.

"My mother's probably gonna start breakfast for everyone in about fifteen minutes."

I smiled, enjoying the warmth and smoothness of her amazing body against mine. "Means we got time."

"Not enough to go again I'm afraid." Maggie said, ironically rubbing my cock against her palm and bare thigh. "Damn, I know you're the first guy I've slept with, but I really like your prick."

"You say we can't go again and then you-"

Maggie was grinning. 

"Right." I laughed. "That's fine, because I wanted to talk to you about something serious."

"Ugh." Maggie smiled against my collarbone, closing her eyes. "Now?"

"You have no one to blame by yourself. You said you would come to me next time, so I let you. This is the only chance I've had to speak to you all week."

"Mf." 

She frowned, kissing me tiredly before pulling away.

"Fine." she drew a circle around my bare chest, shrugging. "What is it?"

"I trust Hershel, he's done a great job protecting this farm and raising you and your siblings. Otis and Jimmy are great farm hands, and I trust Otis' wife too, the little I've seen of her."

Maggie sniffed, shrugging again. "I smell a but coming."

"But."

Maggie tutted.

"It's a matter of time before your father loses control of this place. Not everyone who comes across this place are as nice as I am."

Maggie frowned again, turning around. She laid on the makeshift bed I'd made in the barn's second floor next to me.

Even with both of her nude breasts visible I took her words seriously. "I don't think I wanna talk about this."

"Your father calls them sick, but until we get to the bottom of this, we have no idea what the Infected are. Whether they're Undead, Runners, whatever the hell they are. They sure don't deserve our sympathy until we figure out a cure."

"And your solution?"

"We seek out help. We pack our shit up, drive out, until we find a cure."

"My daddy says there is no cure."

I put my hand on her wrist. "And what if he's wrong?"

"You're a great farm hand, good looking, and I spent last night missing you inside me. But I trust my father's word over yours."

There was a bit of awkward silence when Maggie cuddled up to me, and I hugged her close to me.

"How sure are you about this? Even if you're right, a big if, you're risking a whole lot. No, we're risking a whole lot."

"I'm very sure. Maggie, the undead overran my whole town. They can travel in packs, who knows if whatever affected them can't evolve. Most viruses, or pathogens, do."

Maggie perked up a little bit looking at me a little weird.

"What?"

"Go on."

"Yeah, we need a bigger group. To meet with other survivors who were able to beat the outbreak, come up with a sort of plan to discover a cure. And then go and find it."

Maggie appeared to be looking at me quietly, in deep thought.

"The way you talk sometimes. I really do wonder if you're just some kid from a small town in South Carolina."

"I am."

"I think you could be, but you don't act like it all the time, and I grew up around those sorta people all my life. Either way, you're a bit strange here and there."

"Do you like strange?"

"Fuck yeah."

We started to make out, and I could feel Maggie beat me off under the covers. I started to feel lost in her body, her hair, her beauty.

And then I pulled away. 

"Go help your mother with breakfast."

"You orderin' me around?"

"No more than you are."

Maggie smiled a bit when she started to dress herself again. "I'll shoot you if you sneak into my bedroom. This only happens one way."

Given the way the Greenes have acted since the day I met them, Maggie probably wasn't kidding. Mostly.

"I think I'll be having a conversation with your father about that shortly."

Maggie froze, stopping at a button after she put her bra back on. "You're serious."

"I won't tell him everything, but I will tell him I want him to start considering leaving at some point."

Maggie paused, thinking.

"Let me tell him."

"You're sure about this?"

"I don't know where we're going." Maggie looked at me. "If we're staying, if we should go. But the only one who's survived on their own outside this farm until now was you. At the very least, we should hear you out."

"Thanks Maggie."

We grinned, kissed each other goodbye, and she traipsed out of the barn just as the morning sun's rays began to touch her house. She rubbed Donnie's head as the pup panted and laid by my truck, and Maggie used a tree to clamber back into her room.

...

Soon after midday it happened.

"Hershel wants to speak to you."

Annette broke the jovial air between Shawn, Otis, Jimmy, and I as we plowed the fields and worked on maintaining the fences. Her face looked serious, she was never cross with me, and for the first time, she appeared like she was.

Annette led me to her husband, who was waiting for me in the dinner table. 

Beth and Maggie were standing behind Hershel as he sat down. I could see Patricia washing some plates or something in the corner of my eye in the other room.

"Go to your rooms girls."

Annette said nothing, but a small nod was enough to get her to leave and close the doors, giving us total privacy.

His daughters left him, and Hershel began to speak to me.

"Before we say anything else, I need to know. What has happened between you and Maggie?"

The silence was the answer Hershel needed. I wasn't going to lie to the man, but I needed his trust too if he was going to believe what I'd tell him about what laid beyond this farm.

"This was the thanks I get for letting you in here."

I suspected that he didn't know we had sex per say, just that something romantic had happened. If he knew we had slept together, there was no way he'd be this calm right now.

"I like her very much sir, I-"

"She's young, but she's not a teenager anymore. She's not my little girl." admitted Hershel. "Either way, I was hoping you'd have asked for my permission before courting her."

"If it's any consolation Mr. Greene, she courted me."

Hershel barely reacted to this. "Now, Beth and Maggie told me a little bit. But I need to know, what's this I hear around the ranch about you wanting everyone to leave?"

"It's the safest option. As I proved by showing up on your doorstop, anyone can tell from the highway where you are. Right now most folks are still figuring out their groups, where to go, deciding how desperate they want to be about food, shelter, supplies."

I admitted this painfully.

"And women."

Hershel sighed. "You're assuming the absolute worst in people."

"You did when you met me right?"

He stopped.

"Look, you don't have the walls or numbers to hold this place against the Dead or any bandits for longer than a year at most."

"The Dead?"

"They may be sick, I'll admit it. But they're not people anymore."

"But even you admitted there was a cure right? That in part, admits that these people are sick."

"Yes, there's probably a cure." I shrugged. "We're never going to find it though, by staying on this farm. You're a vet, you'd be an incredible asset to any group. Otis is good at hunting, and Shawn and Jimmy are great with animals."

I sort of lied about Otis. He was an excellent shot with the right visibility, but I did see why he was the kind of man to accidentally shoot a young Carl Grimes when trying to kill a deer.

"So where do we look for this cure? How do I abandon this farm my family's been on generations. How do I abandon my own beliefs that have kept this family intact for generations too, because my daughter trusts a boy she just met?"

I sighed.

"The dead can run at you trying to eat you."

Before Hershel could speak I did. "I've seen it. They ate my entire town, I was the last person I could find. The only living thing besides me who survived, was my dog."

I looked at this man, he was silent. As was I.

I didn't see an idiot, I didn't see an overprotective father in Hershel Greene, nor what I would typically expect from someone who owned a ranch this far out in Georgia. If he was, he'd have told me to leave this place at the end of a shotgun. Or worse. His compassion and protectiveness came from love, not fear. But it was his love that could get his family killed. And I get why this was more about pride, Hershel was essentially be handing over the protection of his wife, three children, and his entire household over to me and at least my idea if we left.

"You saw how well the farm started to run since I got here? How much happier your kids were?"

Hershel nodded slightly.

"Follow me Hershel. Follow me, and we won't just make your family happier. We can make everyone, everywhere, affected by this horrible disease happier. All you have to do, is trust me. And follow me."

"How can I know what you say is true?"

"You don't have to. But consider your situation, right now, everything for about a dozen miles in all directions is empty. The town's empty, almost all the roads and woods are empty. But what will you do when they're not? Do you really think everything will just stay the same because you believe it will?"

Hershel stroked his beard a bit.

"The army cleared out all the people around for this entire part of the state. My town wasn't so lucky, and I could drive you back there right now and show you what's left."

"What's there?"

"A giant pile of charred and burnt corpses. And the most empty town you might ever see."

True, I looted it of every conceivable supply and stocked it all in my truck. Any Infected I also blasted away.

I looked at Hershel, and just by how he looked at me, I could tell it was tough for him to spot that I was lying.

He took a deep breath, and nodded. "I'll talk to everyone else. If we're decided to go with you, we'll let you know by sundown."

"Thank you, I-"

"Regardless. I want your things packed, you're gone from here. It's up to us now if we're leaving with you."

[You've gained + 5 WIS from convincing Hershel of your story!]

I just nodded to the man. 

...

I was waiting by the truck, opening the car door for Donnie as Hershel approached. 

The fact that he wasn't alone, and the entire ranch stood beside him, told me they'd chosen to go with me.

"It's true then. You managed to break out of that whole town all on your own? You and this dog were all that survived?"

I looked at Maggie, surprised she'd told her father everything from the bits of truth I'd sprinkled over the extremely short time we'd started...dating? Fucking?

Surprised, but I didn't think less of her.

I gave Hershel a nod.

"I don't see a liar when I look at you son. I don't know what I think yet. But I do have to know, where is the next best move?"

I considered where exactly we could gather the strongest group. The best size, the best fighters, scavengers. In the event that the cure failed at the CDC, or there was none. I'd need the best people with me.

In this part of the country, right now, about two and a half weeks after the outbreak. There were only two men I'd trusted right now to help me save people and build a group, if it could be saved from the dead at all.

Lee Everett and Rick Grimes. I suppose I'd be in charge, but still.

"Macon, do you know where that is?"

"I do, it's not too far, but why?"

"The towns closer to the coast might've gotten luckier. It could've hit them last. Avoids Atlanta at least, there's no way anyone survived that, or avoided whatever mess the army set up as a safe zone."

Hershel seemed to like this answer.

He and Annette whispered together for a bit.

He turned to me. "I don't want my farm, to end up like your town. You understand, that if you're wrong. Some of us, may die. Do you want that?"

I glanced at Shawn, and Otis.

Then back at Hershel. "Everyone's going to die quite soon, the way this thing spreads. It will consume everything it possibly can until there isn't a living person left uninfected on this planet."

That much was beyond certain. The dead ran, and if it wasn't for the Gamer. I'm pretty sure I'd have become a zombie myself in that town.

I knew that Infected ran in The Last of Us, who knows how much more serious this apocalypse could get? As if it wasn't serious enough to begin with.

"If you think this is just some odd sickness how come the town's been empty for weeks? How come no one's driven on that highway for the past five days?" I pointed in the distance. "How in the world is that just a sickness?"

"Macon then?" asked Hershel, with extreme reluctance, but safe caution in how he spoke.

"Yup." I said.

Three horses in a special cabin attached to Otis' truck, the Beth, Annette, Victoria, and Maggie all rode in an RV, Jimmy, Shawn, and I all looted and managed to get running from a nearby town. And we were off, driving southward.

I wasn't sure how to feel, but I had started my own group of survivors.

...

...

...