Prologue: Through Daryl's Eyes
The way the walkers swarm around Michonne, it's enough to get a fella's heart pumping a touch faster than normal. There are dozens of 'em and she never bats an eyelash. She lops one's head off of its shoulders with sickening ease here and impales another through the eye there. She moves with the eerie combination of a ballerina's grace and a psychopath's killer instinct.
Michonne seems to take a sick sort of pleasure in every walker she puts down. I dispatch a few of my own running along in her footsteps although there's a difference. I just feel sorry for 'em most of the time but it's me or them. I ain't gonna be no walking sack of maggots.
Michonne slices and dices her way through another cluster of walkers. I lose count after five of 'em tumble in the opposite directions of their heads. I loose a bolt from my crossbow into the forehead of one of the herd's stragglers when it comes too close to her. I trust Michonne's instincts but those things can move fast when they want to.
We run through the twisted and tangled undergrowth of the Georgia woods. We quickly outdistance the majority of the herd though we keep our eyes peeled and our pace never slows. They could come out of nowhere.
We hustle along in silence through the woods darkening under the sun's retreat. Michonne doesn't say a word and I'm too focused on breathing evenly to press her for conversation. She doesn't want to talk to me and I understand that it's her process. I'm pretty damn surprised when she finally speaks up.
"Everybody's been talking about you," she says simply, "about how you might be takin' Rick's place."
It's my turn to be silent for a spell.
"I hate to say it but it's kind of true," I reply reluctantly.
We slow to a brisk walk as the moans of the walkers fade into the distance with reassuring speed. That silence falls upon us again and I can't stand it.
"I know what it feels like," I tell her softly as I shoulder a low-hanging branch aside, "to lose someone you love like a brother. Or like a sister."
Her cold, intelligent eyes swing around to stare at me flatly.
"I said I didn't want to talk about Andrea," she answers, "I'm here for one thing and one thing only."
She turns back and continues her inexorable pace through the undergrowth.
"I'm here to kill the Governor," I hear her finish to herself in a soft whisper.