Chapter 6: The Supply Partnership
Over the next week, Scott and Glenn develop a rhythm—meeting at designated spots, coordinating supply runs with hand signals and careful planning.
The abandoned coffee shop on Fifth Street becomes their unofficial headquarters, its shattered windows providing excellent sight lines while its rear exit offers a quick escape route if things go wrong. Glenn arrives first each morning, checking the perimeter with practiced efficiency, while Scott approaches from a different direction to avoid establishing predictable patterns.
"He's methodical about this. Not the impulsive kid the show sometimes portrayed. Out here, Glenn's a professional."
Scott finds himself genuinely enjoying Glenn's company, his quick wit and resilient humor a welcome relief from the crushing isolation of the past week. When Glenn makes jokes about zombie movies and complains that reality doesn't match Hollywood, Scott has to bite back responses about plot armor and character development.
The hardest part is hiding every System notification and ability usage.
[MINIMAP UPDATE: WALKER PATROL - 3 HOSTILES]
[DISTANCE: 50 METERS NORTHEAST]
Scott casually suggests they take a detour around the block, claiming he heard movement from that direction. Glenn gives him a sharp look but follows his lead, and they avoid the walkers entirely.
"You've got good ears," Glenn observes as they approach their target—a small pharmacy tucked between a laundromat and a defunct cell phone store.
"EMT training. You learn to listen for sounds that don't belong."
It's not entirely a lie, but it's not entirely true either. Scott's enhanced senses come courtesy of his System's passive abilities, not his medical background. Still, Glenn seems to accept the explanation, filing it away with all the other small inconsistencies he's started noticing.
Because Glenn is noticing. Scott can see it in the way the young man's eyes track his movements, how he pays attention when Scott "intuitively" knows which buildings are safe and which ones hide threats. Glenn is putting together a puzzle, and Scott can only hope the final picture doesn't reveal too much.
Their first close call comes on the third supply run.
They're raiding a sporting goods store when Scott's attention gets pulled away by a System notification.
[EXPERIENCE MILESTONE REACHED]
[LEVEL UP AVAILABLE]
[NEW SKILL POINTS: 2]
[ALLOCATE NOW? Y/N]
The interface hovers in his peripheral vision, demanding attention, and Scott makes the mistake of focusing on it instead of his surroundings. He doesn't notice the unstable shelving unit above him until Glenn tackles him sideways, both of them hitting the ground hard as metal and merchandise crashes down where Scott had been standing.
"Jesus Christ!" Glenn pants, rolling off him. "You okay? That thing would have caved your skull in."
Scott stares at the pile of debris—camping gear and hunting equipment and a ten-foot section of industrial shelving that definitely would have killed him. The near miss leaves him shaking, not from the physical danger but from the realization that his System might be more liability than asset if he can't learn to ignore its interruptions.
"Thanks," Scott says, meaning it completely. "I owe you one."
Glenn grins, the expression transforming his face from serious scavenger to young man barely out of his teens. "Buy me a pizza when this is all over and we'll call it even."
"In another timeline, he gets that pizza. He gets to marry Maggie and have a family and grow old. In this one, maybe I can give him that chance."
Scott helps Glenn gather supplies while pushing away thoughts of baseball bats and Negan's twisted sense of justice. They work in comfortable silence, each man carrying more than his share, until Glenn breaks the quiet with an observation that makes Scott's blood run cold.
"You know, you're either the luckiest guy I've ever met, or you've got some kind of sixth sense for danger."
Scott's hands still on the medical supplies he's packing. "What do you mean?"
"Today makes three times you've steered us away from trouble before we could see it. The walker patrol on Monday, the unstable floor in that apartment building yesterday, the pharmacy with the tripwire this morning." Glenn's voice is casual, but there's steel underneath it. "Either you're psychic, or you know more about this city than you're letting on."
"Shit. I've been too obvious. Need to deflect without lying outright."
"Just paranoid, I guess. EMT work teaches you to assume everything's dangerous until proven otherwise."
"Uh-huh." Glenn doesn't sound convinced. "And the fact that you always seem to find exactly what we're looking for? That pharmacy yesterday had antibiotics hidden behind a false wall. How'd you know to check there?"
Scott's mind races. The truth is that his System's Keen Eye ability highlights hidden caches and secret compartments, but he can't exactly explain that to Glenn.
"Experience," he says finally. "You learn to think like people in crisis. Pharmacists would hide the good stuff from looters, so you check for concealed spaces. Emergency responders stash supplies in non-obvious locations. Pattern recognition."
Glenn considers this for a long moment, then nods slowly. "Makes sense. Still seems like more than just experience, but..." He shrugs. "Everyone's got secrets these days, right? As long as yours don't get us killed."
The conversation moves on, but Scott notices Glenn watching him more carefully from that point forward. Not suspicious, exactly, but definitely evaluating. Like he's trying to figure out whether Scott is an asset worth the risk of introduction to his people.
Their personal moment comes two days later, during a rest break in an abandoned coffee shop. They're sharing a can of peaches Scott "found" in his inventory, passing it back and forth while they wait for a small horde to clear out of their next target building.
"Can I ask you something personal?" Glenn says suddenly.
Scott tenses. "Shoot."
"You ever feel like you're seeing things before they happen? Like you know what's coming next?"
For one terrifying moment, Scott thinks Glenn has figured him out. Then the young man continues, and Scott realizes he means something entirely different.
"I mean, like survivor's intuition. Some kind of sixth sense for danger. Because sometimes I swear I can feel when something's about to go wrong, you know? Like the world's trying to tell me to turn left instead of right."
Relief floods through Scott so strongly he has to fight to keep it off his face. "Yeah. Yeah, I know what you mean. It's like... pattern recognition, but faster than conscious thought?"
"Exactly!" Glenn's eyes light up. "Like your brain is processing information you don't even know you're seeing. Micro-sounds, changes in air pressure, subtle signs that something's off."
They talk for another hour about survival instincts and subconscious threat assessment, and Scott finds himself sharing carefully edited versions of his experiences. Glenn opens up too, talking about missing his family, wondering if they made it to the refugee centers before the bombs fell.
"They were in Michigan when this started," Glenn says quietly. "My parents, my sister. I keep telling myself they're too smart to get caught in the initial chaos, but..."
"But you don't know," Scott finishes. "And not knowing is almost worse than knowing the worst."
Glenn nods, and something passes between them—a recognition of shared loss, of the weight of carrying hope when hope might be cruelty to yourself.
Scott shares his own carefully constructed version of loss, using his EMT background to explain his knowledge of trauma and grief. It's not entirely a lie—he did lose people when he died in his original world. But he edits out the part about transmigration and system interfaces and knowledge of how this story is supposed to end.
"Sometimes I think about just walking north," Glenn admits. "Finding out for sure what happened to them. But..."
"But you've got people here who need you."
"Yeah. And maybe that's enough. Maybe family is what you choose to protect, not just what you're born into."
"In the show, he finds that with Maggie. But first he has to survive long enough to meet her."
Their biggest breakthrough comes at the end of the week, when they successfully retrieve critical medical supplies from a veterinary clinic. Scott uses his System's Keen Eye ability to locate a hidden cache of antibiotics and surgical supplies, but he's careful to make the discovery seem natural—checking logical hiding spots, following EMT protocols for emergency supply storage.
Glenn's eyes widen as Scott pulls bottle after bottle of medication from a concealed compartment behind the clinic's x-ray machine.
"Jackpot," Glenn breathes. "This is exactly what Dale needs for his respiratory infection. And the surgical supplies..." He trails off, studying Scott with new respect. "How did you know to look there?"
"Veterinary clinics often double as emergency human treatment centers in rural areas," Scott explains, which is true. "They'd want to keep controlled substances separate from the general inventory."
"Right. Smart." Glenn starts packing the supplies with obvious excitement. "This changes everything. Dale's been getting worse, and we didn't have the meds to treat him properly. You might have just saved his life."
The weight of those words hits Scott harder than expected. In the show, Dale's eventual death comes from walker attack, not respiratory illness. But here, in this slightly altered timeline, a simple infection could kill him if left untreated.
"Every small change ripples outward. Every life saved creates new possibilities."
As they prepare to return to their respective hiding places, Glenn extends the invitation Scott has been waiting for.
"Listen," Glenn says, shouldering his pack. "My people are going to want to meet you after this. These supplies—you just solved a major problem for us. And your medical training..." He pauses, choosing his words carefully. "We could use someone with your skills. EMT training, good instincts, and you're not crazy. Well, no crazier than the rest of us."
Scott hesitates, and for a moment the weight of what he's about to do overwhelms him. Meeting the camp means meeting Shane, Lori, Carl, Dale, all the people he watched suffer and die. It means pretending he doesn't know their stories, doesn't know what's coming.
It means becoming responsible for changing their fates.
Glenn must interpret his hesitation as fear, because his voice grows reassuring. "They're good people. We take care of each other. And with Rick—" He stops, shaking his head. "Well, we're doing okay. Better than okay, actually. We've got security, shelter, food stores. It's not perfect, but it's home."
"Rick. He mentioned Rick. But Rick is still in his coma, still three days from waking up. Unless...?"
"Rick?" Scott asks carefully.
"Our leader. He's... recovering right now. Medical situation. But he's good people. You'll like him when he's back on his feet."
Scott nods, filing that information away. So Rick hasn't arrived at the camp yet, which means the timeline is still roughly on track. But Glenn's phrasing suggests Rick is part of their group somehow, which is different from the show.
"I'd like to meet them," Scott says finally. "If they'll have me."
Glenn grins, the expression lighting up his entire face. "They will. How could they not? You just saved Dale's life."
[QUEST PROGRESS: EARN TRUST (3/5 RUNS COMPLETED)]
[GLENN RHEE: TRUST 55/100 - "RELIABLE PARTNER"]
[NEW SKILL UNLOCKED: DANGER SENSE RANK 1]
[PASSIVE ABILITY: DETECT THREATS WITHIN 10M RADIUS]
[LEVEL UP! 3 → 4]
[NEW STAT POINTS AVAILABLE: 5]
That night, Scott stands at the edge of the city, staring toward the quarry's direction marked on his System map. Tomorrow he'll meet Rick's family without Rick, will see Dale and Andrea and all the others who'll die if he can't change things.
His hands clench around his renamed crowbar—"Walker Breaker Mk.I"—and he whispers to the empty night, "I won't let it happen the same way. I can't."
The System offers no judgment, just a new waypoint pulsing steadily in his peripheral vision.
[SURVIVOR CAMP - 14.7 KM]
Scott adjusts his pack, checks his weapons one final time, and starts walking toward a future he hopes to rewrite with his own hands.
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