The Other Side
Michonne was getting sick of loving and losing.

The door slammed shut.

Michonne gulped loudly at the sound of it, hands that were wrapped around Andrea's shoulders tightening and for her stony expression to once again crumble at how in this silence she could hear every laboured breath of the woman next to her as she struggled to breathe through the fever that was slowly overtaking her system.

"Got to be another way, got to be, got to be," Michonne muttered more to herself than the other woman next to her, eyes meeting Andrea's for a brief moment before gazing up towards the ceiling with her eyes narrowed to stop the faint light of the room from blinding her completely, "got to be, got to be, got to be."

Mike's lifeless eyes stared down at her and for a moment it felt like the whole world was being swallowed in the pale orbs of her dead boyfriend, an ending that did not need to be so terrifying on the larger scale of things – and being swallowed up by the abyss (completely painless) did not sound so horrible now did it?

She had said the same words before, and now that she was repeating them did she finally realize how sick she had become of hearing them; there was no other way, there was no damn other way and so once she loved and lost and there was nothing she could do about it.

Michonne was lost in a despair that she had so sure she would be awoken from once she held Andrea in her arms once more, safe, sound and entirely locked away from the miserable atrocities of this world that dogged her ever step she took; but now that was nothing more than a dream, a dream that had kept her going for so long and would now the one thing that would keep her awake at night in hope she'd never think of it ever again.

There had to be a way…

A hand brought her back from the edge, eyes snapped open wide as she glanced down at the woman next to her; a woman who had been so strong and vibrant and so utterly hers (even if neither of them had wanted to acknowledge that in truth they had been each other's) and now looked so weak and dull slumped against the metal walls of this prison. How was that fair? How was anything about this situation fair?

"I…" Michonne watched in horror as the blonde choked on her words, her first instinct being to cup the other woman's face in her palm and lift in hope that it would help with the words that were now starting to tumble out of Andrea's mouth., "didn't want you to really see me like this."

The strangled sob that left her mouth could not be stopped no matter how hard Michonne tried to stop it, not even when Andrea rubbed at her thigh soothingly; as if that made everything better, something simple as touch.

"Michonne," Andrea called her name, her words slurred and slow as though she was trying to speak through water; appropriate really considering that just looking at Andrea this way made Michonne feel as though she was drowning with no hope of ever surfacing.

The blonde woman's eyes were rimmed red with unshed tears, a sight that caused Michonne to gulp so loudly that she almost didn't hear what the blonde was saying.

"I'm going to die Michonne," a hand moved up her thigh to grasp at her cheek, turning her blurry-eyed gaze towards the dying woman in front of her. "And that's alright Mich, that's fine…"

"The hell you're going to die," Michonne snapped at her companion before she could stop herself, a fresh wave of tears sprouting out of nowhere to cover her vision as she blinked hard to stop herself from crying anymore. "The hell you are!"

Andrea's hand moved downwards to cover her lips, stilling her of the sobs that threatened to burst from her lips. "Don't pretend any differently," she smiled a wry smile then and a chuckle filled the near silent room. "Amy's going to be pissed at me for not lasting the whole damn way."

Michonne shook her head. "This isn't over."

"Of course it's over!" Andrea choked on her own laughter at that point, eyes narrowed with humour that didn't quite match the unsteadiness of how she held the gun resting in her palm.

The humour however soon disappeared and a look of anguish took its place as Michonne shuddered at the light brush of lips against her own.

"I'll wait for you on the other side," the blonde murmured, pulling back to wrap her hands around the back of Michonne's neck so that she could trail her fingers soothingly up and down the skin that had emanated warmth for her to keep warm throughout the time they had shared together. "Take as long as you need, take as long as you want; but I'll wait for you."

Michonne felt the press of lips against her own briefly once more before she was greeted with the sight of the other woman pressing a gun to her own head, the dry smile on her face the same one that had been the reason Michonne had gotten up some mornings in the winter.

"It's okay," Andrea whispered again, tears sliding down her cheek as the sound of Michonne's deep breathing filled the silence of the room they sat in. "You're going to be okay Mich, even after everything you're…You're going to be okay."

'No I'm not,' Michonne wanted to protest but that was neither fair on herself or on Andrea, thus she remained quiet and took the blonde's remaining hand in her own to squeeze as hard as she could; to remind both of them that everything that had been a part of their journey had been real, so real that it was something neither of them could forget.

Andrea's eyes never left hers, not even when her last words were uttered and the sound of a deafening bang swallowed the silence whole.

"I love you."