DAMNATION.

chapter seven, state of mind.
[ season seven, episode seven ]

WHEN HER EYES PEEL open she's not in the place she was when she died. Instead she stands in the very field where she took her first life. She turns in desperate circles. How did she end up here? Why is she here? What is happening!?

The last thing she remembers is being hit by Francis, one of her ghosts.

"Hey, kid." A voice stops her cold. He's never spoken to her in her hallucinations before because he can't. Because his throat is always slit so deep she can see his spine. He isn't supposed to be able to talk!

She slowly turns and the first thing she does is gasp. Standing several feet away from her is Shane Walsh. She brings a hand to her heart. He isn't covered in blood and his throat isn't slit open. She doesn't understand. What is this?

She knows this isn't heaven. Shane wouldn't have gone and she sure as hell isn't going to live in Paradise for all eternity. Neither of them have ever deserved the peace that is Heaven.

Yet somehow Shane stands before her clean of blood and any injury. He wears the clothes he wore the day he died though, his hair is still shaven all the way to his scalp. His twenty-two number chain dangles over his chest.

"What is this?" Odessa asks.

"The Middle," he answers, he looks around it. "You're trapped here because your real body is fighting between life and death right now."

"What?" She laughs, "are you crazy? That's like something straight out of a movie. Either you die or you survive. There's nothing like this in real life."

Shane smiles weakly at her. "Oh, but there is. You're here because death is winning. If you haven't noticed, you're fading, Odessa." He nods down to her body.

At this, she looks down at her body. Her hands are half way gone. She gasps, "what is this?" She looks back at Shane with wide, scared eyes.

"Your body is dying." He explains. "And once it does your consciousness will pass over to wherever to either Heaven or Hell. You won't stay in the Middle."

"Then why are you here?" She asks with furrowed brows, confusion etched into her face.

"Because I am the other half of you." He says.

"What?" She questions. "What the fuck does that mean, Shane?"

"I am your other half. The day you killed me you lost what little bit of innocence you had left. It was the turning point of your life. Your actions that night weighed the good and the evil inside you and they are perfectly balanced." He tries to explain to her but stops when he sees the clear confusion on her face.

He sighs, "in the short way of putting it, I am you."

She stares. "No. You are not me. I am not you." She hisses. "I'm Odessa Grimes and you're Shane Walsh. You're a monster. I'm not. I'm a good person. I'm a good person, Shane!"

Shane nods. "And that's why you're going to live."

Odessa's body shoots upward with a gasp. The four people in the room all flinch at her sudden movement. Her eyes are blurry, her whole body aches. She blinks several times and when her vision finally clears the first face she sees is Negan.

She goes to lunge for him but is snapped back into place. She looks at her wrist. Low a behold, both of her arms are handcuffed to the bed she is in. She looks back at Negan, "what the fuck?"

"Extra precautions." He shrugs. "No, what the fuck was that in your cell?"

But Odessa doesn't respond. Her eyes shoot to the person standing behind Negan. "Carl? What? Why do you have him here!?" She shouts.

"Oh, him?" Negan points back at Carl. "This little shit is a stowaway. He killed two of my men!" Negan laughs. "His balls are almost as big as yours, Little Miss Murderer."

"Carl?" She looks at him. He only looks down at his feet. "What the hell?"

"Now," Negan clicks his tongue. "You gonna enlighten us on that stunt you pulled in your cell?"

She doesn't answer him. She looks around the room. It's obviously an infirmary. The other two people in the room are Kathleen and a doctor.

"I— I don't know?" She finally says.

The doctor steps up, "I'm Doctor Carson. I'm the doctor here at the Sanctuary." He tells her. "We found you in your cell half dead. There was blood everywhere. You have a broken nose, one of your back molars has been knocked out. Did someone come in and attack you?"

She shrugs. "I really don't know."

"Well, um, I believe you did it to yourself." Doctor Carson steps up. He then looks to Negan, "may I?"

Negan nods. Doctor Carson unlocks one set of cuffs. He gently grabs Odessa's wrist and holds her hand up so she can see it. Along her knuckles are deep purple bruises. Her brows furrow.

"Your knuckles show sufficient signs of an attack. Negan and Kathleen have questioned every Savior that walks through that hallway, no one admitted to hurting you. And there was blood on the wall of you cell." Doctor Carson explains to her. "I think you harmed yourself in some type of episode or fit. Do you have an mental illnesses?"

"It's the apocalypse, how the hell am I supposed to know that?" She makes a face at his question.

"Okay," Doctor Carson nods to himself. He then looks at Kathleen, Carl, and Negan. "May I speak with her alone?"

Negan clicks his tongue. "I guess so," he sighs. "Plus, I wanna take Carl here on a tour of my palace."

"Wait," Odessa says. With her free hand she reaches out for Carl. He looks at Negan and the man nods. Without a moments hesitation, Carl is hugging his sister.

She buries her face in Carl's shoulder. Her free arm is wrapped around his shoulders, pulling him closer. The days they've been apart has felt like years to the siblings.

Unbeknownst to the Grimes children, this is the very moment Negan develops a fondness for the two. Not in a creepy way, no. He likes their fearlessness and their bold, frightening glares. He likes their determination and the fact the don't hesitate to point a gun at someone.

In Carl's ear, Odessa whispers, "I'm going to escape. Tell Dad I'm okay." They pull apart after this. Carl looks down at his sister and kisses her forehead. She smiles weakly at him.

"I love you," she squeezes his hand.

"I love you, too, Des." He tells her.

As Kathleen, Carl, and Negan leave the infirmary she hears Negan mutter something along the lines of, "damn Grimes kids always ruinin' my day."

Odessa is left alone with Doctor Carson. She wants to ask if he is Doctor Harlan's brother because they have the same last name but if she hints that she knows Harlan then the Saviors will know about their partnership with the Hilltop Colony. And she will not risk the lives of the people there or their partnership.

Doctor Carson sits on the stool by the bed. He has a clipboard in his hand. If the walls weren't concrete and she wants handcuffed to the bed this would feel like a doctor's appointment from Before.

"Okay," Doctor Carson starts, "I've been monitoring you ever since Negan brought you in. You've been unconscious for sixteen hours. It was touch and go for the first couple hours but we finally got you stabilized about three hours ago."

"Did my heart stop?" She asks with furrowed brows.

"It got to the point where we couldn't feel it because of how faint it was." He informs her. "Now, I don't know exactly what happened but I can make an educated guess." He says then asks, "would you like to know?"

Odessa nods. She's completely silent. Maybe she is about to get the answers she's so desperately wanted for nearly a year. Maybe she can finally know what the hell is wrong with her.

And so Doctor Carson begins. "Firstly, I can diagnose you with severe depression, anxiety, and post traumatic stress disorder." He says. "I asked your brother some questions, he didn't want to answer but once I told him it was for your well-being he complied."

"What type of questions?" She interrogates.

He doesn't tell her. Instead, he asks her the questions. He starts off strong with: "have you had suicidal thoughts?"

She stares at him. Her lips are pressed into a tight line, her eye are void of any emotion. Doctor Carson sighs, "I need you to be front with me, Odessa. Completely honest, okay?"

"Yeah," she shrugs. "I mean, who hasn't?" He nods and write something down. "What is this a fuckin' therapy session?"

"Kind of, yes." Doctor Carson answers her. "Are you suicidal?"

She is taken aback by the question. His question is so sudden. Is she suicidal? She's never given it much thought. Yes, she's pressed a gun to her temple more times than she can remember. She's considered slitting her wrists. But does that make her suicidal?

"I don't know?" Her words come out as a question.

Doctor Carson nods. "Have you been experiencing hallucinations or hearing voices in your head?"

She is scared of this question. Because she doesn't understand how he can possibly know that. She looks down at her hands.

Doctor Carson watches the teenager with a frown. His heart aches for this girl.

"How often?" He asks.

"Every day," she whispers. She can hear the doctor's sharp intake of breath. "The voices, the people I've killed or lost, everyday. They're here everyday."

"Okay," he nods. "Have you experienced uncontrollable anger? Have you ever wanted to hurt someone because of something small?"

Odessa answers both questions with a three letter answer. "Yes."

Doctor Carson finally looks up from his clipboard and to the girl. She stares at him with her blue eyes that have lost their shine over time. Her skin is pale and sweaty. Her nose is heavily bruised and bent at an awkward angle after being broken and snapped back into place.

"It may not be one hundred perfect accurate but I believe I have a diagnoses." He tells her. She looks at him expectingly. "I believe you have brief psychotic disorder, schizoaffective disorder, and intermittent explosive disorder, otherwise known as IED."

"So, what does all of that mean?" Odessa asks.

"Brief psychotic disorder is most commonly triggered by a major stressful or traumatic event. Some symptoms are changes in eating or sleeping, hallucinations, and confusion." He tells her. And it makes sense. It makes too much sense. It explains why after everything that happens to her the voices come back.

"Schizoaffective disorder is what I believe is affecting you the most. Schizoaffective disorder shares traits with schizophrenia. Symptoms of this can be hallucinations, hearing voices, self-harm, depressive episodes, thoughts of suicide, impulsivity, and appetite changes." He informs her. Her eyes jump around the room, she looks anywhere expect Doctor Carson because she knows he's just diagnosed her with a mental disorder.

Then he goes on to tell her about the third and final of the major diagnoses.

"IED is experienced mostly with men but women can experiences it. Causes can be from exposure to violence at an early age, experiencing physical or emotional trauma, of exposure to explosions behaviors around you, such as your parents, siblings, the people you are with most of the time." He explains to her. "Symptoms are angry verbal outbursts, repeated episodes of impossible, aggressive, and violent behavior, and sudden anger."

Odessa is deadly silent. Doctor Carson stands and turns his back to the Grimes girl.

That is his second mistake.

His first was not cuffing her left hand back to the bed.

She glances at Doctor Carson and them back at the nearby counter. If she moves carefully enough if she can grab the scalpel on a metal tray. She reaches across herself, glancing back at Doctor Carson. She wraps her fingers around the scalpel.

She shoves the scalpel up her sleeve. When Doctor Carson turns back around, it looks like Odessa is still staring blankly at her bare feet. When he steps closer, he gently pats Odessa's hand. This is his third mistake. When he does, she slides the metal scalpel from her sleeve and presses it against his wrist.

He looks at her, there is a look of wariness on his face but not a trace of shock. Her eyes narrow. "Undo my other cuff and maybe I won't kill you."

He unlocks the other cuff for Odessa Grimes.

This is his fourth mistake.

_____________________________

word count: 2,143

come on, guys. did y'all really think i actually killed odessa?? i would NEVER!!!!!! her purpose is not served yet and besides odessa is my baby and i love her way too much to kill her.

ik a lot of you are probably upset with me and didn't wanna read the book because you were reading for the sole purpose of odessa's story but i promise you, odessa is not finished yet.

guys, i'm cruel but not THAT cruel. odessa grimes is not dead. she's too stubborn for that. she's going to reunite with her family once more.

so now that we've got that out of the way, let's talk about this chapter a little bit. so we know what's wrong with odessa. thanks to doctor carson we know of her three major mental illnesses.

i've had this part of the story planned since way back in season two. we all know she's had voices in her head, hallucinations, night terrors, and major anger problems since season two. now we know the illnesses she has that causes them. my poor girl deserves better.

anyway, odessa is about to girlboss her way out of the sanctuary. she knows if she doesn't get out now, she might not ever make it out alive. seeing carl and almost dying has driven her to escape.