Ch. 13

"This is where you were held?" Daryl asked Michonne as the group entered a storage room.

"I was questioned," she snapped.

"Any idea where else they could be?" Rick asked her.

The front of the building had curtains drawn and Seeing flickering of lights from the other side of the curtain, I moved it aside a little and saw people walking by. Old people, young people, the kind you'd see walking around back when shit was normal.

"I thought you said there was a curfew" Daryl had joined me looking out the window.

"The streets are packed during the day. Those are stragglers"

"If anyone comes in here, we're sittin' ducks. We gotta move" Rick protested.

Sam stood off to the side with Oscar. The two of them looking at the door that led to the main street. Shadows passed over the windows. Sam could see how relaxed and at ease the shadows seemed to be. As if the world hadn't gone to shit and it wasn't anything but a regular Friday night. Is it even Friday night? Sam thought to himself. It was so hard to remember the days of the week, ever since the world ended at least.

There was a clicking at the front of the building and a man in a hat and vest walked in. "I know you're in here," the man called out. "I saw you movin' from outside. You're not supposed to be in here and you know it."

Sam readied his knife, his vison narrowing and his hear racing. Come on, come on, just a little closer, a sinister voice said in his head.

Just as the man was going to cross into the room, when Sam would jump and plunge his knife into the man's neck, Rick jumped out and pinned him up against the wall, covering his mouth and holding his gun to his head.

"Shut up," he ordered him, "Get on your knees and hands behind your back." Rick threw the man to the floor as Daryl tied his hands behind his back. "Where are our people?!"

"I don't know," the man told him. Rick shot Sam a quick look.

Sam nodded ad moved to the man, his knife still in his hands. "Where are they?" He asked, his voice calm, his knife pressed against the man's throat. "And tell the truth or I will kill you, right here, right now."

The man's eyes widened and Sam saw a wet spot begin to grow on his pants.
"I-I don't know! Please you have to believe me I don't know!"

Sam looked to Rick and nodded slowly bringing his knife away from the man's throat.

"Open your mouth," Rick ordered him and the man did as he was told. Rick shoved a rag into the man's mouth gagging him. Sam hit him over the head, knocking him out cold.

"What's the plan?" Sam asked.

"Plan hasn't changed," Rick growled out.

All of a sudden, gunfire echoed through the town and the civilians began screaming and running in every direction. Sam raised his rifle and the group made their way out the door. They stuck to the shadows and avoided the civilians in the street until they arrived to where they believed the source of the gunfire was.

They followed the hallway in the building until they found a small hidden staircase where they could see who had Maggie and Glenn being led away by several men. Rick and Daryl pulled the pins on their gas grenades and threw them into the narrow hallway. They ran around the corner and grabbed Maggie and Glenn who had bags over their heads. Sam grabbed Maggie's arm and lifted her to her feet.

They tore the bags from their heads and led them through the building and toward the street. The street wasn't very crowded and the group made their way into an abandoned building where they could rest and regroup.

"How bad are you hurt?" Rick asked Glenn and Maggie when they were on the ground and resting.

"I'll be alright," Glenn said, grabbing his ribs as he leaned against the wall.

"Where's that woman?" Maggie asked.

Rick and Sam looked around and saw that Michonne was gone.

"She's gone," Sam said.

"Want me to look for her?" Daryl asked, his crossbow raised and ready.

"No, we gotta get them outta here. She's on her own." Rick said.

"Daryl," Glenn gasped. "This was Merle."

Daryl stopped in his tracks, staring at Glenn. "You saw him?"

"Face to face. Threw a walker at me. He was gonna execute us."

"Does he know I'm still with you?" Daryl's face was still full of shock.

Glenn nodded. "He does now. Rick, I'm sorry, I told him where the prison was."

Sam swore under his breathe while Rick nodded. "No need to apologize, we have to get back, can you walk? We got a car a few miles out."

"I'm good," Glenn reassured him.

Rick turned to Sam next. "Sam, you got any ideas?"

Andrea was doing her rounds that Philip had told her to do. Making sure that the citizens of Woodbury were tucked in and safe. It annoyed her to no end of how he was treating her as if she didn't know how to handle herself.

She had just walked out of one of the apartment blocks when the gunfire started. The guards stormed over to where the sound had started. She quickly pulled her pistol out and ran over. Smoke began to fill the street restricting her visibility but she kept on.

Through it all she spotted someone. It was a man in a blue jumpsuit toting a shotgun. She raised her gun, prepared to shoot the man, when she saw another man. He had black hair, was rather tall, and a machete was strapped to his belt, the rifle in his hands looked familiar, but that was when he turned around. Even in the darkness she could see the gray of his eyes, the cockiness of his smile. It was Sam.

But what was he doing there? Why was he there, shooting at the people of her new settlement?

And then it all came back to her. The conversation with Rick. How he had told her what Sam had done, whom he had killed, the kind of person he was.

And that was when she began pulling the trigger.

They were in deep shit, there was no denying it. Outmanned and outgunned. It was probably only due to the smoke grenades that they had lasted so long.

Daryl fired his AK at the men attacking them. "You guys go ahead. I'm gonna lay down some cover fire!"

"Don' do anything stupid Redneck!" Sam shouted as he shot one of the Woodbury defenders. The man rolled on the ground in pain and for some reason Sam felt a sudden relief.

"Don't worry Paddy I'll catch up!" He threw another smoke bomb and began laying down covering fire as the rest of them got to their feet and ran for the walls.

Maggie and Glenn went up the wall first while Sam and Oscar covered them.

Sam fired into the crowd of armed guards and, as if time had slowed, saw a man with a shotgun pump a round into his chamber and take aim at Oscar. He reacted. Just like he had done so in the beginning. He just did.

He felt the burning in his shoulder before he hit the ground. All of those stories where the main character didn't feel the bullet when it went in, bullshit. It was the first thing he felt. The multiple metal pellets tearing into his skin and muscle. He screamed when his shoulder hit the ground, among the pain worse than he would have imagined.

He saw Oscar shoot the man that he shot him. He screamed again, and then, embraced the darkness.

When Sam opened his eyes, the first thing he noticed was that his shoulder was wrapped tightly in bandages. Then he heard sniffling so he opened his eyes. Hershel, Beth, and Sophia were all sitting to his right. Sophia was the only one awake, and she was currently wiping her eyes of tears, Sam grimaced, knowing the pain that he had probably caused them and sat up slowly, careful not to move his left shoulder to fast.

"Hey there Soph," Sam said softly. "What'd I miss?"

Sophia sat up quickly and rushed in to hug him. He winced from her sudden contact with his shoulder, but smiled and wrapped his right arm around her and brought her in tightly.

"You're okay!" she said, her voice muffled since her head was buried in his unwounded shoulder.

"Was there ever any doubt?" he asked softly.

She pulled away and shook her head, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. Hershel muttered something as he slowly began to stir.

He opened his eyes and was fully awake when he saw Sam sitting up. "You're awake. You gave us quite the scare Mr. Conall."

Sam shrugged and crossed his eyes when his shoulder began to throb. "Yeah, I'm fine, aside from the pain in the shoulder I don' feel too different."

"You need to let the shoulder rest," Beth began to wake up, "Don't use the arm too much, at least for a couple of days. After that I'll check the bandages and let you test out your arm. Understood?"

Sam nodded and Herschel did the same. Sam was about to say something else when a blur of blonde hair rushed into him throwing him onto the bed. He groaned, and moved his shoulder popping a few bones and ignoring the throbbing.

"Hello Beth," he whispered. He heard Hershel chuckle and lead Sophia out of the cell.

"I'm so glad you're alright!" She whispered before she pulled away and slapped him across the face. "Don't you ever do that to me again!"

"Alrigh' I'm sorry Beth, but it was either do that or let Oscar take a shot in the chest, and I wasn't about to let that happen. Is everyone else alrigh' though?"

"They're fine," she told him, "Well, Daryl… never mind! Just, just lay here, with me. Please?"

Deciding that he could be a bit selfish and not have to worry for a bit, Sam laid down with Beth and the two of them cuddled. And although Sam' bobby was resting and recovering, his mind was racing. Because he knew that war was coming.

AN: Hey guys! Ok, I know, it's short but I needed to get it out because I am stressing and this is kind of my escape. So I will try to get my next chapters out quick, but they may be a bit shorter, I don't know. So please review, and I'll see you next time! ~Pacco1