(Easy Part and Lost Boy replies)

Guest Thank you!

Blood on my Machete Thank you. Also, just, I need you to know how amazing your support has been. I adore you.

BloodGutsandChocolatePudding I. Love. You.

Rolo-chan That does sound cool, I just don't want Oliver's depression to become romanticised. But I do like your ideas. Thank you! AND THANK YOU FOR TOKYO GHOUL!

DarthGranola Thank you infinitely. Your support has been phenomenal.

IWalkOnMyOwn Hello! Good seeing you over here! Thanks! Yeah, the story is more popular over here, which is really nice. And that site's got some horrible glitches, and I was getting cyber bullied by someone so I just had to leave.

RIGGSSIVAN I've been posting the AU, that's something!

Guest Ha! Yes! Thank you about the Glock. I actually went back and made the changes. So hopefully no more Glock plot holes

greenaardvark Aw, thank you so much. I've been dreading it, but now it's here, and so here's the new chapter. Just... I have to not think that there's only eight episodes left this Season...

CodeName A.N.D.Y I'm more excited about your thing you're doing than I am about anything ever. You think I'm exaggerating? Because I'm not. And it's not sad because it's you and you are so freaking awesome! Which is also 'expected'. Because you are :D Haha thank you. I actually have a little scene thing planned for Oliver and Morgan.


A packet of cigarettes fling from Mrs. Neudermyer's hand and her skull is split open at the mercy of someone's tomahawk. I see it through the window. I watch. They climb over the walls, dressed in cloaks with rags over their faces and chains twisted around their shoulders and arms. Carl ducks out of the window, pulling me with him. I switch off the stereo, grabs my holster — drop it. He helps me. We organise ourselves quickly. Outside, people are screaming. Carl shuts Judith in her room. As we come downstairs, the house smells of paprika and Carol rushes across the living room. She grabs Bean before he can get to the window.

"We saw them from upstairs," Carl says. "They're coming in from all over."

"You both have to stay here and keep Judith safe." She leaves.

Carl looks at me, then away when we hear gunshots.

"They're killing us," I say.

"We can defend ourselves," he says back.

We shut and lock every window and door in the house, collecting ourselves at the base of the staircase when we're done. Something smashes outside. People are screaming. Shooting; but not much. Then there's rattling at the back door. Bean's hackles rise, twice his normal size. I put my back to the wall opposite the door. Carl next to me, rifle ready. Hearts racing, we watch a shadow move across the curtain. Carl switches walls. As the door opens, we take aim and Enid startles.

"Hi?" she says.

I grab her and pull her inside.

Carl locks the door. "Why didn't you just knock?"

"I have these," she says, presenting a set of keys. "Didn't want them to have them." Snatching them, he marches into the kitchen and tosses them by the cooking timer. "And... I wanted to say goodbye."

I look at her.

"Watch the backdoor," Carl instructs. "Tell me if you see them coming. Oliver, get the—"

"I'm not staying," Enid argues, following us into the living room.

"You're not going anywhere," he tells her, moving the coffee table aside. "Sit down. You're helping us protect Judith. They're not getting inside this house... We're not gonna let them."

Reluctantly, Enid drops her backpack and sits on the floor with him, back to back.

"Did you see them?"

"They're just people." She sounds tired, clutching Bean close. "This place is too big to protect. There're too many blind spots. That's how Oliver and I were able to—"

"They got in the walls," Carl says. "They're gonna die. All of them."

He's mad at both of us.

"Don't tell me goodbye," he says.

Enid looks at me and inhales. "Okay... I won't."

I sit with them, making a triangle shape in the space between our backs. We watch the exits. Carl tries to touch my amputation, but I pull it away. I put it in my lap. Should've wrapped it. And I'm thinking about this when a horn goes off — so loud it could blow the house down. We don't speak. We don't move. Something's on fire. It smells like train stations and infirmaries.

I shuffle across the room to the window, ducking as a man I've never seen before runs across the street. He has a chain around his neck, a W scar on his forehead — I've seen that before, on the walker Enid and I found. Óhara just watches him, stunned. She has a big brother named Brad and a black dog and as she turns to run a machete comes down across her shoulders. I watch. He chops her up. Splits her open. He dips a dirty red finger into her chest and paints a 'W' over his own scar.

I stagger back.

Something touches my shoulder and I flinch. It's Carl. I know he's talking but I'm not hearing it. And for a few minutes I'm not hearing anything. I throw up. I realise I'm not the horn is off. And I start to think properly again.

"They don't have guns," Enid says.

Don't look out the window.

"Yeah," Carl replies, "yeah, that's good." They both look very small, like children. It occurs to me that they are. That we are. Carl shudders. "Ron..."

Suddenly both of them are rushing to the door. I follow them. Ron is across the street, between houses, running for his life. One of them is chasing him, a young-looking man with black hair and a wild face. I aim for his face but I shoot him through the leg. He screams, crashes to the curb, and his machete flies across the street. Ron passes us, horrified. My hand aches with Backward. Carl steps ahead of me, before the stranger, glaring down the barrel of his rifle.

"Please, man, please? Please don't kill me, man! Please! Help me, please? My leg!" Suddenly, he lunges and snatches Carl's leg — at a gunshot, he and stumbles back. He looks at the barrel of his gun, confused, then realises I'd shot him. I help him up. We look down at the stranger, the blown-out hole in his jaw. He's moaning.

Carl steps in front of me. He tells me, "I got it," and without another beat, puts a bullet through his forehead — I get caught up thinking if that was my kill or his.

Carl walks away.

"Come inside," he tells Ron. "I can keep you safe."

Ron looks at Enid standing on the porch with Bean, spooked and out of breath, then turns to us again. His lip curls. "No."

He turns and walks away.

"Ron!" Carl calls, but he's gone.

"Guys, come on!" Enid shouts.

Carl grabs my wrist, heading back, but I can see another stranger, dragging Barbra by a chain behind some houses a few streets away. Carl hasn't noticed and I don't tell him. I say, "I have to go," and he says, "Oliver," and I say, "I'll be back," and then I'm running around the lake, after Barbra and the stranger with the chain. He pushes her down in the bushes and the grass. He holds her down. She's thrashing and screaming and he puts the chain around her neck — and I ram into his side. We both barrel into the lake. Cold eats me. Then I'm drowning. Gulping. Grabbing. I'm pulled up. A wet, bloody face, bared, yellow teeth.

I slash him across the eyes.

He falls back into the water, screaming. Stumbling for the ground, I grab him, stab him, again, and again, and again, and again, a big, dark-red circle pooling around us, and then he is still and I trudge out of the water. Barbra is crying. I ask her if she's seen Carol. She says no. She say he was going to... but she doesn't say what. I walk away, soaked and freezing. There's blood in the street. Windows are smashed. Alexandrians lay killed and mutilated outside of their homes. I watch dark smoke rise into the sky, climb the thin tower of smoke, linger at its top a moment, and then...

I stand there outside Mikey's house. The front door's kicked in. A crimson trail leads all the way from the bottom of the steps into the house, a hand-print is against the frame. I go in, gun drawn, dodging and hiding. The basement is open. As I go down, I see a woman kneeling down in something, facing away and talking to herself. Blood everywhere.

"You chose the slow way, my love," she says.

"P – please..."

My legs are tree roots. I see what it is now. The something she is kneeling in. Mikey. Curled up under the pool table in a lake of his own blood. Picked apart and spilled out over his own lap. Numb all over, I shoot her in the back and she collapses forward against him. I cover my mouth, let go of my gun, yank her off — Mikey looks at me, eyes rolling back. I take his hand because he holds it out for me. He's trembling so hard I can't hold it steady.

"I don't want to die."

He's crying. I am, too. And I'm hurting him by trying to move him so I sit behind him instead. I don't know how long I sit there. Mikey just holds onto me. He finds it hard to keep breathing. He'll be still for a moment and then he'll writhe and sob and beg for help, and I'll push my arms around him and hold him together. All of him. His organs and his flesh. His breath becomes slower. He's gritting his teeth. Throwing his head back. Pushing his face against me.

"I don't want to die, Oliver," he says again, and says other things but it's hard to understand him. His face is tucked into the crook of my neck. He splutters up blood across my collar, down my shirt. He shakes so hard I can't hold him still. "M — My dad's gonna kill me. Getting... blood on his... stupid pool table."

I laugh, only I'm crying, and then I kiss him. I whisper, "I'm sorry," into his fringe. Mikey nods like he understands, but he doesn't. Not this. "I'm sorry," I sob again. Mikey looks up at me and I kiss him again. His blood runs down my neck and soaks into my shirt. "I'm so sorry, man."

I'm fast, and he only screams for a moment before it's over.


Notes

Not gona lie. Feel like a monster after writing that.

I kind of loved that once upon a time Mikey promised Oliver he wouldn't kiss him as a joke and in the end it was Oliver who kissed him. Sucks it was a oh God I really don't want you to die! kind of kiss tho.

I'M WELL AWARE THAT MIKEY MIGHT BE ALIVE... fuck. Edit later: fuck off it's been two seasons and we haven't seen him once.

So there's this amazing human being called CodeName A.N.D.Y who has an account over on FictionPress under the name Andy.T and their works are absolutely diamond. So really, check them out. They're so great. Laughter for Liam – I highly recommend reading to anybody, ever, in the universe. Ps. The abrupt end of this chapter was inspired by it, so thank you infinitely, Andy!

As always,
Happy reading.