Disclaimer: I don't own AMC's The Walking Dead or any of its characters, wishful thinking aside.
Authors Note #1: This story is meant to fit during the latter half of season three, in Woodsbury, after "It's a Sorrowful life" but before the season finale. This will probably be proven very much AU after the season finale but hey, a girl can dream right? – Either way, consider this what I hope will happen in regards to Milton's character in the finale.
Warnings: Contains season three spoilers, references to Milton and the Governor's background, adult language, mature content, and well, smut.
Radioactive
When he'd gotten her out, he'd taken her hand. And honestly, until they'd reached the wall, that was how they'd stayed. Until necessity had pulled them apart and he found himself leaning up against the eastern gate, weaving his fingers together and boosting her up the moment the kid on guard turned the other way. Tossing the sack he'd hidden in an empty oil drum up behind her before following suit.
When it had happened, it had happened fast. There hadn't been time for questions or debate. Though she'd certainly tried, asking how and why and a million other half-heard whispers until he'd shushed her and fumbled with his belt knife, cutting through the ropes that had bound her hands with a few awkward tugs.
He'd winced as the stainless steel had groaned, warping and popping underneath her as she'd shifted in place. Yanking on the ropes tied around her ankles until he crouched down and dealt with those as well. Trying to ignore the frenzied beat of his heart as the last bond gave way and she nearly collapsed into his chest. Head resting in the crook of his arm for a long moment as the salty tang of fresh tears soaked into the sleeve of his jumper. Whether those were from gratitude or exhaustion, he didn't know.
All he knew was that when he'd taken her hand and pulled her upright, she'd smiled. Her blue eyes were back-lit with a caustic mix of anger and determination, completely at odds with the way her shirt collar did little to hide the bruises. The extent of Phillip's treatment made terribly clear. But in spite of it all, when he'd asked if she could walk, she'd nodded. Making for the door at a dead run as her fingers threaded between his, closing around him like a promise.
And when they'd hit the stairs and she still hadn't let go of his hand, he hadn't questioned it.
His lungs were already burning by the time they hit the tree line and stumbled through a half dried river bed. He let Andrea take the lead as she cut through the brush with far more confidence than he felt. Heart pounding and alert for the sound of pursuit as they cleared the ravine and crashed through a thicket of lying brush. It was only a matter of time before The Governor realized she was missing and even less before the man realized he was gone and put two and two together.
Internally, his mind was screaming, caught between telling him to run faster and screeching for him to turn back. Brain sending out bursts of conflicting information as panic rose up in his throat like bile and the sound of a revving engine roared to life in the distance.
Christ, what was he doing?!
He'd left Phillip. What kind of friend does that? Phillip needed him, perhaps now more than ever, even if he didn't know it himself. And here he was leaving. Just like the man's wife, and Penny, and well, everything. It wasn't right. It wasn't-
Only in spite of all that, he knew he wasn't being completely honest with himself. That man was gone. The man he'd been holding onto, the one who, before all this, he'd tentatively called his friend, had been erased. Broken down and remade by grief and rage into something lesser than he'd been before. Phillip had been the only senior in high school that hadn't picked on him when he'd skipped three grades and hit high school before most kids were hitting puberty. He hadn't known if it was pity or morality, but Phillip, all tall, handsome and popular, had taken a liking to him early on and soon everyone knew better than to mess with him.
He'd faced the imposter on Main Street only a few days before. Desperate for a glimpse of that leggy teen who'd led the high school football team to the state championships three years running, or of the man who'd written his own vows and cried openly the day his daughter had been born. Only he hadn't found him. And honestly, he didn't know what was worse. The threats the man had leveled him with or the emptiness he'd seen reflected in those keen, ice-cold eyes when he'd forced himself to meet them.
He jumped over a fallen tree and skidded into a tangle of stripped berry bushes, defying gravity for a few ageless moments as he dug his palms into the loose soil and took off again. Watching Andrea's blond ponytail bob reassuringly just up ahead. Vest flying out behind her like some sort of parachute before she ducked underneath a low-lying branch and disappeared from sight.
And for one of the few times in his life, he actually cursed. He was damn well out of shape!
He caught up with her a few seconds later, slowing gaining ground until they were running almost side by side. Pace leveling out to match hers as she caught his gaze and smiled grimly. The distant growl of an eight cylinder engine being all the encouragement they needed to keep on running.
It was around the same time as when they caught sight of their first walker that he started reciting the periodic table inside his head. Getting as far as strontium by the time they blew past - leaving the biter, a thin, emaciated shell of an old woman, in both their physical and metaphorical dust as they gave it a wide berth. He found that the structure of the table soothed him. It was all absolutes and sureties in a moment where he was facing none of those things.
Phillip had always joked, long before the virus, that science was akin to his security blanket, and in a way, he certainly hadn't been wrong.
And when he looked back a few minutes later, just before Andrea angled them west and into a thick corpse of trees, he wasn't exactly sure how he felt about it when he realized that the terrible thing was still limping determinedly after them. A single black speck framed behind a rapidly darkening sky.
Because if that wasn't a metaphor for their lives these days, he didn't know what was.
There was a gun he didn't know how to use tucked in his waistband. He thought he would have forgotten about it by now, but without a holster it'd dug into his spine every other step. Proving itself impossible to ignore as his brain reminded him of every statistic he only half recalled about accidental discharges and faulty firing pins.
Christ, had he even checked to see if the safety was on?!
The knife strapped to his thigh was easier - unfamiliar, but safer. He'd swiped it from…someone. It has been lying on the table next to Andrea, the point sunk at least three inches deep into the thick mahogany finish, and honestly, he hadn't even thought twice about taking it. Like a magpie courting a piece of silver or a child hoarding a small pile of coins, he'd just snatched it and ran.
He didn't know what had gotten into him lately, but whatever it was, it had done distressingly little to calm his nerves. More like the exactly opposite actually. He was in over his head and he knew it.
He barely had time to process the change as they broke through the trees and stumbled into the small clearing. Most of the space was taken up with abandoned All-Cats and stacks of sewer piping, remnants of some county funded project – but near the edges a small cluster of stumps remained. Almost as if they'd just finished logging and were about to start digging before everything had gone to hell.
But before he could get a good look, Andrea suddenly whirled in place.
"Milton! Down!" She hissed, yanking him down behind a pile of abandoned construction equipment when he hesitated. Nearly doing a face plant into the side of the tractor-trailer as the sudden movement offset their balance, forcing Andrea to dig her heels into the dirt and take both their weights as he crouched down beside her. Steadying himself against the treads just in time to see a small herd of walkers stumble out of the brush not ten meters ahead of them.
He hadn't even heard them, but she had. If he'd been alone he would have blundered right into them. …Jesus.
He held the knife in front of him like a spear. Forcing himself to count backwards from a thousand as the growls of the undead grew louder, closing in from all sides as they shambled past. Lacing the air with their fetid stench as Andrea's hand curled around his shoulder. Firm and grounding as the raspy sound of worn fabric and grating bone rose up to fill the sudden silence.
Caesium, barium, francism, radium… Now switch over to the lanthanoids. Come on Mamet, you know this. Focus. Concentrate.
It wasn't until the group reached the other side of the clearing that she broke the silence. Face dirt streaked and drawn as she levered herself up and prodded at the desiccated remains of a corpse hanging out of the cab of the tractor trailer. Radio swaying in the breeze and faded hardhat left abandoned on the dash as the company logo glinted in the low light. Barely visible through the rusty rivulets of long dried blood and god only knows what else.
"How?" She asked quietly, eyes on the backs of the retreating walkers as the distant roar of thunder echoed through the clearing. Lighting up the side of the cement truck as another flare of lightening followed soon after. And despite the distance between them and the oncoming storm, he swore he felt the vibrations shiver through him as the hard packed Georgian clay crumbled and gave way under his feet.
"You'd think losing an eye would make him more careful. But he's gotten sloppy. He doesn't care who sees him anymore. So I followed him, I figured he'd eventually lead me to you and he did." He explained, adjusting the straps on his backpack as he spoke.
"He told everyone you'd gotten away. But I didn't believe him. I'm just sorry it took so long." He whispered back. Forcing his hands to still as his fingers itched to tuck one of her errant curls back behind her ear. Feeling it ghost across the base of his scalp as she turned around to face him at last.
"But why?" She demanded, voice harsh with exhaustion and probably a million other things she had every right to be feeling as she rubbed gingerly at her wrists - the skin raw and angry as she finally met his eyes. "Why after that whole speech about knowing where you belong and how you can't leave." She insisted.
"…Because it was the right thing to do," he replied after a long moment. "And you were right; it's time to stop turning the other way," he finished, tone low enough that she could hear, but not loud enough to alert the biters that had just passed through, hoping against all hope that she wouldn't ask anymore of him than that.
Because honestly, he wasn't that sure himself.
He didn't know for sure if he was doing the right thing. But lately, perhaps sometime between Mr. Coleman's reanimation and the last attack, he realized he was spending less time worrying about it than he probably should have. He used to be so meticulous, so careful. With every move planned down to the letter, complete with backups and contingency plans. But lately he'd been getting impulsive. Not careless exactly, but perhaps a bit more fluid, more oft to bend than break for example.
The problem was, he was too close to it to determine if that was a good thing or a bad thing anymore.
He didn't know them, Andrea's friends. Hell, he hardly knew her when it really came down to it. He didn't know if they'd make it beyond this clearing, let alone the prison. Or what was waiting for him there if they did. But still, in spite of it all, he couldn't shake the feeling that this was right. That what he'd done hadn't just been the moral thing, but perhaps what he hadn't even known he'd wanted in the first place. Because as messed up as this was, stumbling through the bush, half blind and exhausted, no matter what Phillip said, what he'd done had been right.
Besides, he wouldn't have been able to live with himself if he'd done otherwise.
But he was saved having to answer any more questions when a loud boom of thunder rolled out overhead, the clouds dark and practically roiling as Andrea cussed out a blue streak and leapt to her feet.
"Come on, the prison is only about five miles that way," she insisted, pointing north as she pulled her hair out of its elastic and shook it out, combing through it with her fingers as she made to continue. "If we're lucky we can make it there before the storm breaks," she affirmed, tying her hair back into a severe pony tail before they took off across the clearing and into the forest at a fast jog.
Unsurprisingly, they weren't that lucky.
A/N #1: Thank you for reading. Please let me know what you think! Reviews and constructive critiquing are love! – The second and final chapter will be posted tomorrow. Hope you enjoyed!
"Aerodynamically, the bumble bee shouldn't be able to fly, but the bumble bee doesn't know it so it goes on flying anyway." - Mary Kay Ash