Dead to the World
The air was stale and heavy with the smell of overflowing garbage, and the putrid stench of death. Flies buzzed around sickeningly. It had been weeks since any of us had had a proper shower. I stared at the ceiling of my cell. Believe it or not, this cot was more comfortable than it looked. I could feel myself drifting off to sleep. It's amazing what a person can get used to.
"Rick," said a voice behind me, in what was barely above a whisper.
I turned to face Andrea. She was standing over me.
"Some walkers have broken through the north fence" she said, "I'm not sure we can hold them all back."
"Figures," I sighed."
I grabbed my machete, and put on my shoes. Daryl was in the guard's tower. He was gathering his arrows, and making his way down the stairs. I could see the worry in the faces of the others as Andrea, myself, and Daryl started to make our way to the door, and out into the prison yard.
"How many are there?" I asked, as we crossed the threshold. A small herd of them was ambling towards us.
The dirty and ragged mass of them could be seen scattered across the horizon. All of them, no different than us, they could all be us. My adrenaline was pumping. I lunged forward with my machete in hand and hacked off the head of the walker in front of me in one clean blow. There had to be, now that I could see, at least about thirty of them coming towards us. We worked methodically, beheading them, going for the brain. That was the only way you could stop these things. You had to go for the brain. Body shots, that was like asking to be a meal. The sound of them that was the most unsettling thing in the beginning, before you even knew the damage that they could do. We had taken out all of them but one. This walker, it was coming right towards me. I looked into it's vacant, grayish, cloudy eyes. It was snapping at me, growling, and hissing. I split it's skull with my machete, and heard it's body fall with a dull thud at my feet. The body was still twitching. I could hear the muted sounds against the red clay as it finally went still.
The sound of them—just the sound of their feet shuffling in the dirt is unnerving. The shuffling is the only thing that you hear against the desperation, the desolation, and silence. Bodies are strewn all around the prison yard. Corpses are slumped and draped across each other haphazardly. These are the remnants of the last breach. The stench of these, these things, has become a constant presence. I can't remember the last time that I have breathed clean, fresh air. I can't remember that last time I felt any sense of…I don't know calm -maybe at Hershel's farm in the early days.