"This is fucking crazy," I whispered to no one in particular.

I was bent nearly double behind the curving brick prison sign next to the entrance with Rick, Andrea, T-Dog, and Daryl, sweat trickling down my back into my leather jacket under the morning sun. We had cut the engines up the road and moved slowly toward the prison in a single file. They hadn't wanted me to come, but hell if I was going to wait like a ham on a platter for the potential horde of walkers these idiots might set loose. Besides, Rick had reloaded my little revolver. Not that six bullets were going to do much for me here. As I peeked around the corner of the sign toward the double ring of chain link fences surrounding the prison and the several dozen walkers in the yard beyond, my stomach began to flip. I hadn't wanted to sit like a duck at camp, but I was realizing that I really, really, really didn't want to be here, either.

"Thought you had balls of steel or something," Daryl taunted in my ear.

"And I thought you said you wanted to live," I shot back.

He shrugged. "Don't mean I'm 'fraid to die, though."

"Okay, there's the gate," Rick whispered, pointing toward the enormous rolling section of fence twenty feet away. It was just to let vehicles through - the yard was fenced closed on either side of the road, which was a relief as the gate was half open and leaning back crazily at a forty-five degree angle. The inner ring of fence on both sides contained the walkers. The space between the fences -a span of about fifteen feet or so- seemed to be clear. Rick passed out heavy gloves and a set of kitchen knives and explained what to do.

A half hour later I found myself trying to mimic the apparent calmness of the others as I stood in the grassy alley between the fences, stabbing my knife through the fence and into the eyes of the walkers massed against it. I was terrified the fence would buckle under the sheer weight of them. But it didn't, and it took much less time than I'd expected to clear the yard this way.

"Hell of a way to spend your Sunday morning, huh?" Andrea was on my left, sliding her knife into the empty eye socket of a walker on the other side of the fence.

"Is it Sunday?" Asked T-Dog from down the line. He was holding a wadded bandana to his face with his free hand. I couldn't blame him; the stench was just about unbearable. I was fighting to keep my breakfast down.

"Think that's the guy my brother used to get his meth from," said Daryl from my right, squinting down at a tattooed corpse that had just fallen onto the mounting pile of bodies.

"Alright, everybody just stay alert. We're almost done over here." Rick sounded strained. I couldn't hold that against him, either- it was hard keeping my back to the throng of walkers on the other side of drive, beating and gurgling against the chain link fence.

By mid-afternoon we had cleared the other side as well, and Rick cautiously opened the inner gate on that side. T-dog walked back toward the main entrance where he'd left a can of gasoline, while we began dragging the bodies away from the fence to burn.

I was thirty or fifty yards away from the others, next to the brick wall of the prison, trying to drag a mangled, headless body toward the pile when the steel door next to me burst open. I dropped the corpse and wheeled, trying to grab for my tomahawk, but I was too slow. Before I could blink the thing was on me, all rotting hands and teeth, and I heard Andrea scream behind me as rancid jaws bit down with blinding force into my forearm.

Panic exploded like dynamite in my chest and mushroomed into my throat. Instead of trying to shake the thing off-it might go for my face if I did-I wriggled backward and continued to fumble at my leg. After what seemed like hours, I finally got a grip on the wedge of my tiny axe sticking out of my boot, and I swung it in an arc over my head to plant it deep in the thing's skull. Its body went slack and we both sank to the ground.

I stared at the sky, gasping for air, eyes squeezed tight against the flood of tears I was not about to allow.

"Another one!" T-Dog shouted from behind me.

I scooted back in the grass again as another dead man staggered out the door not three paces away. I jerked at my axe, but it was lodged tight in the skull on the ground. Where was my gun?

There was a whoosh of air above me, and the dead man fell forward, Daryl's arrow gone clear through its skull.

I fought down the urge to sob.

"You alright?" Daryl asked, jogging up.

I nodded, still panting, showing him my slimy leather sleeve, trying to put a clamp on my terror. "Sure. Now we're even." I offered up my hand in a silent request for help up.

He reached down and hauled me to my feet in one swift move. "How you figure?"

"Well, I saved your ass last night," I said with a grunt, wrenching the tomahawk free as I held the skull with my boot. "Only fair that you return the favor, huh?"

He glared at me. "You think I couldn'ta put that walker down quick enough last night? You just got it first."

Since this all had started I had made a discovery about about myself: I get mean when I'm scared. It had pissed Sarah off to no end. And just then I was trying not to turn into a puddle on the filthy grass of the prison yard.

"Whatever. I'll just remember to be twenty minutes away from the next one, so you'll have time to cock that ridiculous bow."

I stomped off toward the others, desperate to get the hell away from the gaping dark door.

"Hey! I jus' saved your damn life, girl!" Shouted Daryl from behind me.

I ignored him, still fighting back tears. Why had I come out here, anyway? These people were going to get me killed.

This isn't going to last, a little whisper drifted through my head. You can't keep it all on lockdown like this forever. You're going to break.

I ignored that voice, too.