Chapter 25

Daryl

Rick T-dog Glen and I went to help the prisoners clean out their own cellblock so that they stay away from us. Their block was on the opposite side of the prison. We walked through the prison killing walkers as they came at us. We made it to a laundry room that was attached to their block. Rick threw Thomas the keys to open the door, I didn't want to help I wanted to kill Thomas and kick the others out of the prison but Rick wouldn't have it. After opening the door, we attacked the walkers that came out, in the corner of my eye I saw Thomas grab a walker and pushed it at Rick, I ran to where Rick was on the ground trying to push the walker off himself. I stabbed the walker then help clear the rest of them. Rick turned to Thomas and Thomas shrugged.

"Accidents happen." Rick grabbed an axe and put it in Thomas's head. Thank fuck he's dead I thought. Andrew ran Rick went after him. When he came back, we lead the last two prisoners Oscar and Axel to the cellblock and left, that was their part of the prison. We made our way back to our block. I could not sleep that night, the man that hurt Emily was dead, but so was she.

I woke up Rick was walking around.

"Let's get the cars in." T-dog, Carol, Rick and I made our way down the field, after moving some of the cars carol yelled out.

"Where is Glen and Maggie, Maybe they can give us a hand." T-Dog turned to her.

"They're up in the watch tower."

"Again." Rick paused. "They were up there last night." I yelled out to Glen he walked out of the tower wearing no shirt. We all laughed.

"You coming?" he looked confused. "You coming?" he turned to Maggie. "Come give us a hand with the cars." He and Maggie got dressed and came down to help us. We finished getting everything inside, Rick Glen and I walked down to the gates, we were going to let the prisoners go. We looked up to the prison, Hershel was up and moving around on his crutches. After a bit of him walking around we noticed something else moving. Walkers! Rick and I ran to the gate to try and get to them, everyone was shooting the walkers. Glen patched the fence up then followed us. We needed the keys, Glen had them. He threw them to me then I threw them to Rick, he opened the gate and we ran to the others. I saw Maggie get Lori and Carl into our block. I ran forward we made it into the courtyard and started to kill the walkers one at a time, T-dog had managed to close the gate again but we couldn't see him anywhere. Once the walker were cleared, Glen said someone intentionally broke the chain on the gate letting walkers in. We were standing there when the alarms went off. Rick told us to follow him, we got into our block, there were walkers in there, Maggie, Carl and Lori weren't there. We headed further into the prison, we had to find the generator and turn the alarms off. We made it to the room with the generator, Rick went to turn it off, Axel and myself held the door close. We heard scuffled he went to go help Rick I stayed there, it was getting hard to keep the door closed, I step away and picked up my cross bow and shot the first walker that came through the door, then I got out my knife and stabbed two more, I pushed a walker back and slammed the door. I came around the corner and saw Axel holding Rick's gun he had it pointed towards Rick. I took out my knife and held it ready to stab him, my hand was shaking, and Andrew whom we thought was dead stood behind Rick with a baseball bat in his hands.

"Do it shoot him we can take the prison back." He yelled. Rick looked at me then back at Andrew.

"Don't do it." Axel moved the gun and shot Andrew, he gave Rick back his gun. Rick walked over to the generator and turned it off, stopping the alarms.

We made it back to the courtyard. Hershel and Beth were in the cage, Glen and Oscar had made it back as well Lori, Carl and Maggie were all missing. We were about to look for them when Maggie and Carl came from the tombs, Maggie was carrying a baby. Rick walked up to them.

"Where is she?" Maggie just stood there crying. Rick broke down crying, Glen went over to Maggie as she cried the rest of us stood there silent. Rick slowly stopped crying and sat there.

I stood in front of Rick he just sat there he didn't respond to anything, anyone.

Hershel wanted to see the baby.

"Let me see the baby." I walked over with Carl who was holding the baby.

"We got to feed it, got anything a baby can eat?" Hershel looked at her.

"Good news is she looks healthy, but she need formula, and soon or she won't survive." I couldn't let another baby die.

"Nope, no way, not her. We ain't losing nobody else. I'm going for a run." Maggie came over to me.

"I'll back you up." Glen looked at her then me.

"I'll go to."

"Okay pick where we're going. Beth." I motioned for her to follow me, we walked about two metres away from everyone else. I whispered to her. "Kid just lost his mum, his dad ain't doing so hot." She understood me.

"I'll look out for him." I turned back to Glen and Maggie. I directed everyone, as I did Rick stood up grabbed the axe and ran back inside. Not much we could do now. Everyone just stared at him.

"Come on we're gonna lose the light." I made my way to the cars, Glen and Maggie followed me. We were deciding on where to go. A shopping mall was our best shot but the road would only allow my bike. Maggie got her stuff and walked towards me. I put Em's poncho on and got on my bike, Maggie hopped on after me and we sped out the gates.

From the back seat Maggie told me where to go. We came across a small kindergarten as the shopping mall was too far for us to go with the amount of time we had. I stopped the bike and Maggie hopped off.

"This is close, stay tight." I grabbed my cross bow and followed her into the yard.

She smashed a window and climbed in, I climbed in after her. I looked around the room, there were cut outs of hands with names in it, I saw one with the name Emily, it was black with purple butterflies, I ripped it off the wall and stuck it in my pocket. We continue though the rooms, we found a kitchen the was a a racoon in the cupboard. I shot it with and arrow.

"Hello dinner." She sighed and looked in some of the cabinets.

"I'm not putting that in my bag." She found formula and put it in her bag. After going through the whole building we only found four small containers of formula, that was not going to last long but we had to get it to the baby. We climbed back out of the same window and headed towards the bike. Maggie stopped and broke down crying.

"Maggie we can't do this now we have to get the formula to the baby." She nodded and stood up shakily.

"If it was your baby, and Emily died what would you have done?" I looked at her.

"I would have raised my baby to learn about how amazing it's mother was and that it's life was worth living even though in this stupid mess it doesn't seem like it." She nodded at me then stood up.

"I know that you miss her." I walked towards the bike and put my cross bow on the back.

"I didn't know her that long it was nothing, we just fooled around." She stood beside me.

"Then why did you grab the thing with her name on it?" I looked down, hopped on my bike, and started it up.

"We got to get going." She jumped on the back and we sped back to the prison. We were definitely not going to lose this baby. I was going to her raise her as if she was my own, especially if Rick did not pull out of this daze.

We made it back to the prison just as the sunset, the gate opened for us then closed behind us. Maggie and I ran into the cell bloke, Carl was holding the baby, I threw my crossbow down and took off my poncho. I walked over to Carl and took the baby from him, she was fussing I could tell she was hungry. Maggie got some formula ready in one of the bottles she found and gave it to me. I started to feed her. I looked at Maggie I knew what I was thinking. If only this was my own baby. I looked at carl.

"She got a name yet?" she looked down.

"Not yet. I was thinking maybe Sophia, there is Carol too." He sighed. "And Andrea, Amy, Jacqui, Patricia, Lori." He looked up at me sad. "Or Emily. I don't know." I froze and looked at him. I turned to the baby in my arms.

"Do you like that? Huh little ass kicker. Right?" I looked at the group everyone laughed. "That's a good name right." I turned back to the little baby in my arms. "Little ass kicker, you like that huh? You like that sweet heart." I stood there holding on her little body, she fell asleep in my arms, I just rocked her and watched her, everyone eventually went to bed. I just stayed there and looked at this little girl. Too many people had been lost we all have to make the best out of what we had.