Chapter Text
It didn't hurt.
It should have. It happened all too fast. The cold metal of the barrel of the gun pressed against his temple before his finger squeezed the familiar trigger. The sound that came was only a millisecond then darkness. An overwhelming black void of nothing consumed his vision, mind, and every part of his soul. He felt everything just stop or at least he thought it did. For even with no light, he could swear he found no after life. No shining white orbs to tell him it's okay, no pearly gates, or golden streets just the smell of heavy dust and light metallic blood.
Maybe he had survived after all.
Carl's singular eye opens even if he subconsciously waits for the other. His hand flies to the scars on the other 'eye' to find no bandages and just what he would expect. The skin there is rough but nothing he wasn't use to by now. His head hurt not overly so but just enough. Groaning he sits up and looks around the room for the first time. Hospital. He was in a hospital.
No this couldn't be right.
He was bit. He shot himself in the head.
That was the end.
There were no hospitals in the apocalypse expect for the crazy one Beth had been in. Carl knew that he was far from there. He had to be. Plus the IV that was hooked to his arm was long drained. The desk beside him was dusty and the air was dry. Thinking of that so was his mouth. He sits up to find himself in a blue gown made for patients. He didn't exactly like how freeing the outfit was. He glances to find a change of clothes on a chair.
It wasn't much just a pair of jeans, a black T-shirt, and black high top vans. He slips it on easily before moving to the window. Bodies, rows and rows of bodies lay outside. Military vehicles and more sat empty in the parking lot. Suddenly, Carl knew where he was. He had made it to his hometown somehow. It should be impossible. No way should he be back here.
Yet, he was.
He smacks his dry lips and heads to the bathroom not wanting to ponder anymore for the time being. The eighteen-year-old turns on the sink and drinks from the softly falling water. It has never tasted so good before and that was saying something. Carl's been without water plenty of times before. It was just what happens in an apocalypse. He looks himself in the mirror to find shoulder length brown hair that partially covers a scared right eye. He scowls at it before searching the room for his Beretta 92FS and hopefully a clip of bullets.
He finds it on a small table near the door with dead flowers in a blue vase. He takes it in his hand and imagines it against his head. From there he sets it back down and raises his new shirt. No bite mark is present where it should be. Nothing but pale skin he was so use to seeing. Carl lets out a short breath of relief. Slowly he clips the holster around his waist and gazes upon the door. Pinned on the door was a calendar with the date 2010 just a month or so after the dead began walking.
This wasn't too out of the ordinary expect for the fact the calendar looked new. Carl ignores the thought and opens the door. He has to press rather hard for he finds a gurney to be in front of the door. Upon entering is the smell of decay. He swallows the familiar bile that comes up and gazes around. Blood, bullet holes, and a few bodies had danced upon the hallway marking its territory. Not far is a the figure of a man. Expect this man is walking drunkenly with panic clear in his movement. Carl draws his weapon, points it towards the man, and hovers over the trigger.
Then the man speaks, "Please, help, sir?" That voice was one he could recognize anywhere. It was his father's voice. He goes to shout out 'dad' but his dad steps into the light showing a young Rick Grimes in hospital gear. Unfamiliarity is set in Rick's eyes and suddenly, Carl knows exactly what has happened. He's at the beginning. The very beginning where his father has just awoken in the hospital.
His throat wants to close as he lowers the gun. Then his father asks, "What's your name? Do you know what's going on?"
Carl wants to scream out and yell that he's his son but Carl isn't. Not now. This man's son was twelve years old, not eighteen. This man's son is a child with his mother and her boyfriend in a camp full of people he doesn't know.
Carl was not this man's son.
He stalls licking his lips scanning his brain for a name before blurting out, "Chandler, Chandler Riggs." He wasn't exactly sure where the name came from. Okay, maybe he was a little bit. He had a friend that had that name. It was his best friend in school and the teachers always got the two of them mixed up.
"Rick Grimes. Chandler," Rick gestures to the room, "what is this?" Rick draws closer and with this Carl subconsciously covers his eye scaring with his hair.
He plays dumb, "I don't know. I just woke up here." He pockets the gun and Rick nods at him uneasily.
"Yeah, that's what scares me. Let's go this way, I believe it leads to an exit." Rick orders in his usual way. Carl nods and follows him. He walks past many bodies and he can see his dad tensing at every dead body they pass. Carl tries to act as if he's bothered as well. He somewhat gives up half way through and just sticks behind Rick. A door he remembers his dad mentioning vaguely is before him.
It reads,
'Don't Dead
Open Inside'
As they get closer hands slide through the gap of the chained doors and their gruff voices are heard. Rick stumbles back into Carl and the teenager steadies him. "Let's keep moving." The sound of Carl's voice only heightens the violence of the walkers.
Luckily for them, the stairs leading out to the world is just a few feet away. Using his shoulder, Rick hits his shoulder against the door and it slams open. Carl follows behind him and rests a hand on the railing of the stairs. No light was apparent in the room. "Don't fall." Carl states resting a hand to steady his dad as they go. Rick nods at him letting Carl opens the outside door for him. The sun momentarily blinds them both with its hot glow. Carl rubs at his eye and peaks out at the death before him.
For the first time, he can get a good look at his dad. He has a short beard from being in a coma. His hair is still relatively short but it's longer than it should be on the top. There's less gray hairs than what he's use to. Carl isn't the only one eyeing the other. "Your eye?"
"Yeah, it's not a fun story." Carl answers turning his view away from him and towards the cars spread out in the parking lot. He sees an old beat up truck and heads towards it.
"Where are you goin'?"
"We won't make it that far on foot." Carl calls back making his way to the truck. He picked this one in particular because the door was already opened. He just hoped it had a little gas. He hopes in with Rick following behind him. Carl sees the keys already in the ignition and cranks it a few times. At the fourth time, it roars alive.
"Are you even old enough to drive?"
"I'm eighteen old man."
"I ain't that old." Rick pauses as he watches Carl pull out of the driveway. "My family, I need to find them. I have a son, Carl, and wife, Lori. You?"
Carl pauses thinking back to his old friend from elementary school. "I'm an orphan, foster kid. I ain't got no family." Chandler Riggs, was a foster kid that had jumped from home to home since he was a toddler. Carl didn't know more than that. "But we can find yours, give me the directions."
Rick did and though Carl had lived there a good deal of his life, he seriously didn't remember the way. It had been too long with too much going on since then. He tries not to dwell on the fact that this is real. He supposed this is just as crazy as the dead walking. Everything in their lives has been psychotic since the moment the virus hit. He can let the thoughts consume his mind later for now he has to focus on this. Driving to his old home knowing that young him and Lori won't be there.
Rick is quiet and Carl assumes it would be normal for him to be so since this is the end of the world. The end of the world and his first time hearing of it. He passes all the homes that basically look the same until he finds the one with a red bike which is the one Rick has said to look for. Stopping the truck, he gets out with Rick and makes his way to the house.
"Carl!"
There is no answer as they make their way through the house with Rick yelling the names of his two family members. Carl tires not to flinch every time his name is called.
"I'm sorry, Rick. They're not here. Clearly they left, there's not even hardly any pictures on the walls." Carl remembers this. His mother scrambling to gather the necessities while also taking valuable memories. Shane had called from the door way for her to hurry. Lori had just screamed a broken reply to him. He shivers at the distant memory.
Rick stumbles outside in a despair with Carl walking after him. He makes it to the door way just in time for himself to be knocked upside the head by a shovel. Shakily he falls to his knees clinching his head and he's just barely aware that Rick is doing the same. He can hear muffled talking but soon the darkness returns. This time he wonders if he'll stay dead.