At the front of the school, Michonne paced, her hand opening and closing over her sheathed katana. A few yards in front of her, nearer the gate, King Ezekiel stood, Jesus on one side, and Morgan on the other. All three were ready for a breach of the walls.
Outside the gates, Richard and his men crouched behind buses and hid in ditches, fingers off their triggers, but ready to fire at a moment's notice.
On top of the school's gym, near the eastern corner, Isaac scanned the horizon through the scope of his sniper's rifle. On top of the school's theater, near the western corner, Jackson did the same. From the platform that lined the wall of the front gates, Tex slid the safety off his rifle, and Malik waited patiently on the roof of a storage building near the back fence.
In the woods along the back of the school, Carl scaled a tree. He was lighter than the adults, and so he could get farther up in the tree branches. He found the highest spot he could safely reach, and there he scoured the area with a pair of binoculars. A long way below, on the cool, hard earth, sat Daryl, crossbow in hand, his back to the rough bark, waiting.
Rick stood three trees over, the walkie talkie clipped to one side of his belt, a handgun to the other, rifle on his shoulder, like in the old days, when he was still a sheriff's deputy.
Carol kept checking the chamber of her rifle, as if to make sure it was really loaded.
Aaron kept shifting his head, as though trying to catch some sound with his ears.
Rosita situated her hat carefully on her head.
Tara unsnapped the holster on her hip.
Sasha closed her eyes and moved her lips in a silent prayer.
And sixty miles away, Glenn's baby stirred suddenly in Maggie's womb. The expectant mother smiled at the unexpected movement, put her hand over her belly, and whispered, "I can't wait to meet you." She imagined her infant, born into hope, bursting its way into a world without the Saviors.
[*]
Branches crunched loudly in the tree above, springing and crackling as Carl came climbing quickly down. Daryl stood abruptly, and the teenager slid the last few feet with an ugh and oomph and a nasty burn from the bark.
Carl landed on his ass on the ground. The binoculars bounced against his chest. "Two groups," he said between his ragged breaths. "One heading toward the east side, and one toward the west side. Evenly split."
Daryl grasped Carl's hand and yanked him up from the ground. "Good job, kid." Leave it to the one-eyed boy to make the best watchman.
"We should move," Carol said.
Rick got on the walkie talkie and informed the other unit leaders of the approaching Saviors. "I'll send half my people to each side." He swiftly divided his forces by pointing, and they ran in opposite directions through the forest to fortify the two borders that would soon be under attack.
[*]
In the days and weeks and months to come, everyone would tell a different version of the story that unraveled. Different scenes would lodge themselves like an echo in the corner of each survivor's mind.
Isaac would remember the bombs failing to explode when he pressed the remote.
King Ezekiel would remember the RPG that landed on the theater and burned down his beloved throne room before the fire was contained by the scurrying bucket brigade. Malik would remember it even more vividly, because it would kill his best friend Jackson.
Rick would remember a large hole blasted in the fence, the fire dying on the gravely ground where it landed, and the Saviors flooding in. He would recall Isaac taking out a second man who was readying an RPG, and then Tara running through the hole in the fence to claim the fallen weapon, firing it boldly into half a dozen Saviors, and being shot to death in the process.
Jesus would remember ignoring every chivalrous instinct within his being to spiral kick a woman in the face. She was about to toss a hand grenade into a stream of fighters, but the kick from Jesus sent it flying in the other direction. He lost his hat and half his beautiful hair – but no part of his life - in the explosion that followed.
Tex would remember struggling to get a lock on a Savior with an RPG, only to watch the man taken out first by Ezekiel's pet tiger, which had been set loose on the invading army when the walls were breached.
Daryl would remember the way Carol ran toward the gunfire, and how she emerged from the smoke with two bullet holes in the tail of her coat, but none in her flesh.
Sasha would remember Aaron's dying words, whispered in her ear, a plea to tell Eric that he loved him.
Michonne would remember dropping her katana when Carl came staggering toward the school and its infirmary, carrying the crumpled body of a boy who was almost the same size as himself. She would never forget taking the barely breathing Hugo from Carl's faltering grasp, or watching the mute boy's silent scream when the doctor worked out the bullet from his stomach.
Carol would remember the almost crazed look of pride in Tobin's eyes as he took down his first Savior, and then the flicker of utter surprise that eclipsed it when a bullet flew into his own chest. She would remember Daryl, forgetting any jealousy he may have ever felt, trying to carry the fallen man to the infirmary, only to slide to his knees in defeat when Tobin stopped breathing, unshoulder his rifle, and return to the fray with an angry cry.
Rosita would remember the lie she later told Eugene - that his bullet had killed Simon. The truth was that she had never even loaded that bullet into her gun, and Simon was overwhelmed by such a barrage of gunfire that it was impossible to know who killed him.
They would all remember the plodding, dirty work that followed the aftermath of battle: putting out the last of the fires, digging the graves for their fallen martyrs, surveying the damage, tending to the wounded, and dragging out the Saviors' bodies, one by one, to mount them in a grim pile. They would remember the flames that licked the bodies of their enemies and turned them once and for all into ash.
[*]
The theater and one of the portable classrooms burned to the ground, but thanks to the well-prepared bucket brigade, most of the Kingdom was spared.
Fifteen men and women were buried in the Kingdom's cemetery that night. King Ezekiel quoted Shakespeare, saying, "Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o'er wrought heart and bids it break." But no one could give their sorrow words, not that night. There were no speeches – only sniffles and stares.
Alexandria had lost Aaron, Tobin, Tara, and a construction worker named Joe. Green Acres lost four men, including Jackson. The Hilltop had lost two. And the Kingdom buried five, among them Richard. Eleven more lay recovering in the infirmary, including Hugo, who finally had his chance to finish The Brother's Karamazov, though he spent most of his recovery time exchanging notes with a pretty girl who was awed by his bravery.
That night, there was no lovemaking, but Carol laced herself tightly through Daryl's limbs in bed, and they lay awake together, long into the night, until Carol broke the silence: "It's over," she said, letting out a long, shaky sigh. "It's finally over."
Daryl encircled her more tightly in his arms, until he could feel her heart beating softly against the old scars on his chest. "But we ain't over."
"No," Carol whispered softly. "We've just begun."