FanFicReader47: I'm glad you liked the chapter. To be frank, I never liked Lori in the show, so, yeah, there's no salvation for her with Tea. Tea's given up on her, so will just be avoiding her from now on. Also, how the hell did you read my mind for the next chapter? I already had the chapter half written when your review popped up...^_^

Azuraskye21: I'm happy you're enjoying my story. I hope I continue to write it well enough for you to continue enjoying.

Andrea and Michonne stood on the road and watched the helicopter crash. Slowly, they walked through the field of straw that lay before them and into the trees. Although she was still sick, Andrea kept pushing on. When they found the crash sight. Andrea heaved a sad sigh then threw up causing Michonne to go into mom mode.

"Don't push yourself," she said. "You'd better sit."

She attached the walkers to a tree before handing Andrea a gun, telling her that she'd go to check the crashed helicopter. Andrea watched as she slowly approached the crashed aircraft. The woman stood still for a moment before continuing on with her katana halfway unsheathed. It was only another moment before Michonne made her way back to her.

"Someone's coming," she told her as she crouched down beside her in the underbrush.

"Any survivors?"

"Two dead, not sure about the other," Michonne responded.

They watched as two vehicles showed up and no less than four men got out. They watched as the men took out the walkers around the crash. One of the men helped one of the soldiers out of the helicopter; apparently the last person survived. As a walker came up behind them, Michonne was ready to kill it, but was stopped by Andrea. It walked on by as they watched as the men carried the injured soldier to one of the cars.

"He's saving them," Andrea commented. "We should show ourselves."

"Not yet," Michonne said.

Ever so studious, they watched as the leader guy plunged a knife into each of the dead soldiers' heads. Their walker body guards started getting antsy, causing the men to begin to notice the sounds they were making. In a split second decision, Andrea watched as Michonne beheaded the things. As their bodies dropped, and silence ensued, the men slowly relaxed until the leader told them all it was time to go. A rustle from behind them and Michonne was ready to take out whatever it was on the other side.

"Uh, uh, uh," came a familiar voice. "Easy does it, girl. Mine's a whole lot bigger than yours. Put down your weapons. That's it. Nice and easy. And let me see your hands. Now spin around. That's it. Nice little twirl around." As Andrea turned to face her captor, she was surprised by the face she saw. "Oh, holy shit," Merle said, looking just a bit thinner than he had the last time they had seen each other. His hair was just a touch longer too, but still just as kept. "Blondie. Damn, you're looking...good." He took out a walker that came up behind him with a blade attached to his missing right hand. Holding it up and his gun cocked to the side, he asked her, "Now, how about a big hug for your old pal Merle?"

Andrea couldn't respond because she passed out. In and out of consciousness, she heard someone call for a med room to be prepped. Her vision was blocked by some sort of blindfold, but not completely. She saw a walker strung up in a tree and briefly thought it was the one she'd found with Daryl in her exhaustion, but it was too out in the open. They passed by several parked cars, what looked to be an armed wall, and into something that had lights every so often. Asking for Michonne, she discovered the woman to be not far off. She tried to look around, but didn't get very far before Merle noticed one of her eyes was partially uncovered. Putting a finger to his lips, he then fixed it to send her back into complete darkness.

A short time later, her blood was being drawn while her temperature was being checked. She'd already been given a bag of intravenous fluids that had helped her fever go down. Andrea could almost be grateful, if they weren't being held in the room with armed guards and the only people they'd seen was a nurse and the guards.

"Why are we being held here?" she asked the nurse as she removed her IV. "We want to leave."

"You're not well enough," the nurse insisted. "And it's dark. You should stay the night."

"Where are we?" she tried a different approach.

Looking around, the nurse told her, "That's not for me to say. He'll talk to you."

"Who?" Michonne asked, clearly frustrated at the turn of events.

"Go check on your patient, Doc," Merle said as he walked in. "Bet you was wonderin' if I was real," he told Andrea. "Probably hopin' I wasn't. Well, here I am," Merle chuckled. "I guess this old world gets a little small toward the end, huh? Ain't so many of us left to share the air, right?" He sat backwards on a chair looking at them, blade missing from his stump. "You know, when they found me, I was near bled out. Starving. Thinking to myself a bullet might make a good last meal. Take myself a nice long nap afterwards. Wait for Daryl on the other side. You seen my brother?"

"Not for a long time," Andrea asked quietly.

"Makes two of us," Merle chuckled coldly.

"He went back for you," she told him. "Him, Tea, and Rick. You were already gone."

"Well," he laughed as he removed his stump from the contraption he had around it, holding it up for Andrea to see. "Not all of me."

"Oh god," she said, turning her head away while he kept chuckling.

"Yeah Rick. He's that prick that cuffed me to the rooftop," Merle said venomously.

"Yeah," Andrea admitted. "He tried. Daryl saw that."

"He's always been the sweet one, my baby brother. He still with that slut?"

"Tea? Last I knew," Andrea admitted. "And she isn't a slut. They wanted to keep looking, but things happen. People died. A lot of people. Jim, Dale, Jacqui, Amy."

"Your sister?" Merle asked, watching as Andrea nodded her head. "She was a good kid. I'm sorry to hear it."

"There were more. A lot more," Andrea told him. "We had to leave Atlanta. We wound up on a farm. Tea and Rick took charge and Daryl stepped up. Became a valued member of the group."

"Now he's dead," Merle assumed.

"I don't know that for sure," she admitted. "We got run off by a herd."

"How long ago?" he asked, hoping this would finally be the lead he needed.

"Seven, eight months," Andrea said, looking to Michonne for confirmation seeing as they'd been together the whole time. "I was separated from the rest of them. Got left behind. I know what it feels like."

"I doubt that," Merle scoffed as he readjusted his metal contraption around his stump.

"What do you want from us?" she asked him as he looked at his arm.

The angry look in his eye did not compliment the small smirk on his face at all as he looked at her. He stood up with the same smile on his face. "Damn," he said to Michonne. "There she sits, four walls around her, medicine in her veins, and she wants to know what I want from her. I plucked you and your mute here out of the dirt, blondie. Saved your asses. How about a thank you?"

"You had a gun on us," Michonne told him in a voice barely above a whisper.

"Ooh, she speaks," Merle chuckled and then laughed and started walking around the room. "Who ain't had a gun on 'em in the past year, huh? Show of hands, y'all. Anybody? Hmm? Shumpert? Crowley? Y'all had a gun on y'all?" He scoffed and looked back at Andrea, "I think I'd piss my pants if some stranger come walking up with his mitts in his pockets. That's be the son of a bitch you'd really want to be scared of."

"Thank you," Andrea told him, remembering how long his rants could be; Michonne just looked at her like she'd grown a separate head.

A man walked in then and called Merle over. After a few moments of whispering from the man, Merle simply gave an affirmative to whatever he'd been told. The man then turned to Andrea, asking how she was.

"We want our weapons," Michonne cut him off and stood in front of him.

"Sure," he said without hesitation. "On your way out the front gates."

"Show us the way," Andrea said. "You've kept us locked up in this room."

"You see any bars on the windows?" he asked, seeming genuinely amused. "You're being cared for."

"Under guard," Andrea insisted.

"To protect our people," he replied seriously. "We don't know you."

"We know enough about you to want out of this place," Andrea insisted, disgusted by what she had seen at the helicopter. "We watched you drive a knife into the skulls of two dead men. What the hell was that all about?"

"They turned," he said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"They weren't bitten," Michonne said, not believing the man for a second.

The man and Merle shared a look after he looked at the two women. Looking down before looking back to them, he quietly told them, "Doesn't matter. However we die, we all turn. I put them out of their misery." He walked past them and said louder, "It's not easy news to swallow at first, but there it is. You're not prisoners here, you're guests. If you want to leave, as I said, you're free to do so. But we don't open the gates past dusk. It draws too much attention." He nodded his head to Andrea, "And you especially, you need a solid night's sleep. You wouldn't last another day out there in your condition. I'll have you brought over to my place in the morning. Return your weapons. Extra ammo, food for the road, some meds, keys to a vehicle if you want. And send you on your way. No hard feelings."

He motioned for them to follow, leaving the room with one of the other men in tow. As they walked down the hall and out the door, he welcomed them to the town of Woodbury. It was an actual town; there were fires being used as street lights and the entire area was clear of walkers. No one was walking around and it might as well have been a ghost town. Andrea could hardly believe it.

"Come with me," he told them.

Michonne helped Andrea down the stairs, Merle following closely behind them for a time, checking out Michonne as he passed her. Andrea watched as the man walked up onto the wall's ledge and relieved a man from his post, sending him to another and taking it up himself. He ordered another man to 'take the spotlight' whatever that meant, but it was clear that he had some authority here.

"Are you military?" Andrea asked the man who had yet to introduce himself.

"Hardly, couple of vets like Merle, but by and large, we're self-trained," he answered her.

"That's heavy artillery their packing," she commented.

"Some men arrive with guns, but most of the weapons were scavenged over time."

"And the other side of town? The other side of the street? They're all guarded like this? It can't be."

"It can and it is," he told her, looking smug.

Merle whistled to him then, "Found us a creeper, Governor." Looking at the other man on guard, he asked for his gun.

"Governor?" Andrea asked, walking up to the gap in the gate. "They call you that?"

"Some nicknames stick whether you want them to or not," he said simply.

"Buzz is a nickname. Governor is a title," she countered, watching as the spotlight shown on a walker. "There's a difference."

As she said that, Merle took the shot. "Got him!" he said happily. "He brought his buddies." Quickly taking down the other two that were stumbling along, he looked back to the Governor and said, "Clear."

"We'll get them in the morning," the man told Merle. "Can't leave them to rot," he said turning back to Andrea. "

Creates an odor. Makes people uneasy."

"What people?" Andrea asked. "There's nobody here. It's a ghost town."

He didn't answer her, just walked away. Merle watched the two women follow the Governor down the road. If he found Blondie, he could very well find Daryl, too. Maybe find that Titania girl Chrystal was always talking about and keep her safe too, if she wasn't already dead. That might actually be the better outcome for the girl if her family ever did find her. He scoffed to himself, thinking about how he cared for a girl he'd never met as if she was his own blood, and all because of some stories he'd heard from the girl's own sister. I've been pussy whipped by a pussy I ain't even had, he thought ruefully to himself, turning back to the outside of the wall.

"Not the Four Seasons," the Governor said as he opened a room in an apartment building. "But there's a hot shower. Water's limited, so keep it short. We got food, water, fresh clothes. Hope this works." As they walked in and looked around, he turned to look at Michonne, "I know you'd feel better with your sword, more secure, but you're safe here."

She just gave the man a hard stare, leaving Andrea to say, "We appreciate it." After a moment, she couldn't help but wonder, "What about the pilot? Will he make it?"

"Well, Dr. Stevens is doing all she can to save him," Governor replied. "Now, I know you got a lot more questions, but I got work to do. My man will be outside the door if you need anything else. I'll see you tomorrow."

In the morning when Andrea and Michonne woke up, Andrea showered and changed into a fresh set of clothes. Andrea even managed to have a cup of coffee! It was surreal and had Andrea hopeful, but Michonne was on edge. A knock on their door introduced them to a woman named Chrystal who was about their age and was there to show them around town. As they stepped out of the building, Andrea was in awe with how many people were out in the street now that it was light out.

"It's real," Andrea muttered.

"You two were out there for a long time," Chrystal said. "While you were, the Governor was doing this."

"How many people do you have here?" Andrea inquired, feeling a sense of familiarity with the woman walking in front of them.

"Seventy-three," she replied, waving to a heavily pregnant woman. "Ellie's about to pop, so her kid will make it seventy-four. It's still a work in progress, but Rome wasn't built in a day."

"That's a bold comparison," Andrea muttered again.

"I think we've earned it," Chrystal said smugly. "Walls haven't been breached in well over a month. We haven't suffered a casualty on the inside since early winter."

"How's that possible?" Andrea asked in denial.

"Our Governor has set a strict curfew. Nobody out after dark. Noise and light are kept to the bare minimum. Armed guards on the fence and patrolling the perimeter to keep the biters away."

"I saw what your patrols do on the way in last night," Andrea told her. "They had a dead one strung up like an ornament."

"Those men put their lives at risk every day to protect this town. Why can't they have a little fun every once in a while? They've lost more than a few friends out there. They're just coping with that," the woman said seriously as she turned and fully faced Andrea. "It's not any concern to anyone. Least of all the Governor. He's got more important things to worry about than the men letting off some steam."

Up close, Andrea couldn't help but compare the woman's face to Tea. They had the same chin, same eye shape, same high cheekbones and lips. But where Tea had hair the color of amber that fell in waves, Chrystal's hair was almost dark chocolate and straight as a pencil. Green eyes were replaced by blue and the whole head of height difference between Tea and Andrea was reduced to a mere couple of inches where Chrystal was taller than her. Andrea almost opened her mouth to ask if the woman had a sister, but she recalled some of the conversations she'd had with Tea. If this woman really was her sister, there was a good chance she would not be happy to find out her sister is alive and well and, most importantly, happy. She needed to talk to Merle about this woman. Hopefully he would have some answers for her.

~x~

He was sitting at a table working on cleaning his gun with a piece of jerky in his mouth. His mind was drifting back to three nights ago when Chrystal had been drunk and talking, as she always did. While the Governor took delight in listening to her stories, as well as some of the darker and more twisted men, Merle kept to himself and his beer. She'd been talking to the Governor about the time she drugged her sister when the girl was only twelve to get money from a pedophile. Chrystal's parents had planned on selling the girl's virginity to the sick fuck who, according to the harpy cackling away, had to be more than 300 pounds compared to her sister's measly sixty. Chrystal herself was the one that delivered the small girl to the man. Merle's stomach rolled even now at the way the woman had spoken about it in delight. Thank whatever god was out there that the little girl had been resourceful. Somehow, even in her drugged state, she'd managed to find a letter opener and stabbed the man through the eye, right into the brain. He thought his dad was bad; her family threw her in juvie for manslaughter until the case was proven to be self-defense. His father might have been a cruel piece of shit, but he sure as hell hadn't pulled anything like that.

Chrystal had come in just before winter started. Having no skills to offer, she began warming the Governor's bed almost right away before she began warming others. Anyone who worked the walls or went out scavenging was free to have her as her way to pay for staying in Woodbury. Merle himself had used her a time or two before he had been invited to drinks with the big players in camp. It was there that he first heard of the cruel punishment a girl six years her junior had endured at her hands, starting from long before she could ever defend herself. The scars on his body were from drunken rages; the scars on hers were from Chrystal simply enjoying the feel of slicing her baby sister up and watching her bleed. She was a sick fuck, that was for sure, and seemed to get off on speaking of the torture she put her own flesh and blood through. Merle had left early that first night, claiming exhaustion from the run earlier that day. While he couldn't avoid those gatherings, he'd taken to sitting as far away as possible, though he still could hear everything that was said. Never before had he felt such pity and anger for another human being.

Through listening to Chrystal's stories, he had grown a bit as a person and come to realize that even he had certain lines he refused to cross. He wasn't sure what all those were yet, but he knew damn well that he'd never punch his baby brother without a damn good reason to again. Hell, some of the things he said to the boy were over the line now. Merle wouldn't say he'd changed, he just realized he wasn't as bad of a person as he tried making himself out to be. Where he once thought himself to be of the same cut of cloth as his father, he now second guessed himself. That's part of the reason he never stopped to question the Governor. He made being something easier.

He was pulled from his reverie by the Governor walking in and asking Milton, his butler for all intents and purposes, "Did you finish your homework yet?"

"Unfortunately, the dog's eating it already," came his response.

Merle's hackles rose as he stormed off his seat, throwing the weapon on the table, "What the hell you call me?"

"Hey, where are we?" the Governor asked him. "Back in the school yard? What, you wanna take his lunch money while you're at it?"

Merle was immediately subdued, "Sorry, Governor."

"Maybe I've wasted my time with you," the man continued berating him. "Maybe you haven't learned anything at all."

"He was trying to smoke in here," Milton said. Fuckin' pussy ass snitch, Merle thought to himself, scowling at the man.

"And you, I expect better," the Governor turned to him. "Keep poking the bear and you're gonna get mauled. Remember that." Turning back to Merle, he said, "Tell me about the girl."

"Name's Andrea," he told him.

"You know her?" Milton asked astonished.

"She from that group in Atlanta?" the Governor asked.

"Yeah," Merle said, thinking about what it could mean for his brother. "Same one that left me on the roof, forced me to mutilate myself."

"Does she know your brother, Daryl?"

"Yeah, she did."

"Then talk to her again," the Governor told him. "See what else you can find out."

Merle nodded at him and left to go find Andrea. Instead, he found Chrystal waiting for him. Of course she was. He'd made the mistake of telling her early on about Daryl, and now the banshee seemed to think that if Merle found him, she could stake a claim to him. As if he'd ever let the crazy bitch near his baby brother. Hell, even that hell cat from the quarry ain't as psycho as this bitch, he thought to himself, suddenly very happy with his brother's choice in woman. Wearing an expression of utmost annoyance, he stared down at the woman.

"Fuck ya want, Chrys?"

"I heard you have a lead on your baby brother?" she asked innocently. "Do you think you'll be able to find him."

"Ain't none of your concern, missy. Now leave me the hell alone," he growled at her.

"Aww, Merle-baby, don't be like that," dropping the innocent act, she played coy and rubbed up against his good arm. "You loved the time you had with me."

"Weren't nothin' more than gettin' the pipes cleaned, sugartits," he told her. "'Sides, I ain't interested in people who beat on little girls."

"Oh, are you still hung up on that?" she huffed out, angry now. "Come off it, Merle. It was a long time ago. And how is that any different from you beating on people?"

"They ain't my blood, let alone a kid," Merle stated simply.

"So what if she was blood or a kid? She was a freak. You hate freaks just as much as me and my parents, so what's the big deal?" she asked, looking at her nails.

"I hate a lot of things, that's true, but that don't mean I'd beat on my brother just to get my rocks off," Merle said before walking away. Staying for one more second would mean strangling the bitch; so far he'd only ever hit one woman in his life, and he wanted to keep it that way.

~x~

In the Governor's apartment, Andrea and Michonne were being treated to an late breakfast consisting of eggs, toast, and peaches. Milton was there too and asking various questions about what they had been doing all this time. It seemed to come as a surprise to him that they had lasted so long on their own.

"Eight months?" the Governor asked. "Hard to believe you ladies lasted so long out there."

"Because we're women?" inquired Andrea.

"Because you were alone," the man corrected.

"We had each other," she told him.

He chuckled, "Two against the world. It's long odds."

"We managed."

"Oh, I'm impressed."

"Very," Milton input as the Governor served him and Michonne some eggs.

"Survival in the wild is tough sleddin'," the Governor stated. "Wake up every mornin' on the ground wonderin' if today's the day. Will it be quick and final or slow without end? Will someone have the good sense to kill my brain, or will I come back as one of them?"

"Do you think they remember anything?" Milton asked her. "The person they once were?"

Remembering how Amy had tried to bite her as soon as she resurrected and then what she had learned at the CDC, she shuddered before saying, "I don't think about it."

Clearly that was not the answer the man was looking for as the Governor spoke up and explained, "Milton believes there might be a trace of the person they were, still trapped inside."

"Like an echo," Milton said as he handed her tea. "Surely it must have crossed your mind."

"At one time, yeah. Right before it tried to bite me."

"And then you killed it?" Milton asked. "I say 'it' only because no one here likes to refer to them as him or her," he cleared his throat as Andrea looked at him over the rim of her cup before handing Michonne one as well. "The two you had in chains, who were they?" he asked the brooding woman. Even Andrea was curious as the woman never spoke much about herself. "The way you controlled them, used them to your benefit. You did know them, didn't you?"

His only response was a hard stare that earned him an admonishment before he apologized for being intrusive. Andrea was thinking about the state of things in the town. It was everything she and Michonne had spent the winter talking about. There was safety in the walls, they had the numbers and the weapons. It would be hard for someone to come in and take it, but also hard to defend it against a horde of walkers. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to stay here. At least there was one familiar face.

"So what you have here, you expect it to hold?" she asked the Governor. "What if a herd comes through?"

"It'll hold," he said.

"What's your secret?"

"Really big walls," he said vaguely.

"That soldier had really big walls, too," she countered, "and we all know how that turned out. So..."

"I guess we do," the Governor admitted. "The real secret is what goes on within these walls. It's about getting back to who we were. Who we really are. Out there, they're just waiting to be saved. People here have homes, medical care, kids go to school, adults have a job to do. There's a sense of purpose. We're a community."

"With a lot of guns and ammunition," Milton cut in.

"Never hurts," the Governor replied with conviction.

"And really big walls," Andrea finished with a smile.

"And men willing to risk everything to defend them. Compromise our safety, destroy our community. I'll die before I let all that happen."

Andrea considered him for a moment, "Looks like you're sitting pretty at the end of the world."

"Do I strike you as the kind of man who sits pretty?" he asked her amused. "You reap what you sow. We're the seed. Now that winter has passed it's time to harvest."

"Time to hope?" Andrea asked, completely unaware of Michonne's gaze on her.

Michonne could see what this man was doing from a mile away, and Andrea was falling for it completely. The man was definitely a smooth talker, but being a lawyer helped her to tell all the bullshit he was spewing and made her wonder how Andrea didn't see it too. Sure, it sounded pretty, but it was all a spiel to get people to stay in her opinion. There was something off about the man, and that feeling was only made stronger by the fact that he had yet to return their weapons. Michonne wanted out of here as soon as possible.

"We're going out there and we're taking back what's ours," the Governor told Andrea. "Civilization. We will rise again. Only this time we won't be eating each other," he ended, making eyes at Andrea.

"To civilization then," she toasted before a knock on the door interrupted their meal.

"How's the tea?" Milton asked.

"Sorry to cut breakfast short, but this can't wait," the Governor told them, coming back to the table.

Michonne rose out of her seat with the agility, grace, and speed of a panther, coming to stand in front of the man, "We want our weapons!"

"Well, we can make this meal to go and your weapons will be waiting outside, but you should take time to relax, get your strength back. Have a look around. Who knows? Might like what you see."

I knew it, Michonne thought. There was no way in hell they were going to let them just walk out the gate. Every excuse would be made to keep the two of them within the confines of these walls, whether or not they wanted to leave. Michonne began to feel trapped, and that was one feeling she did not like at all. They left the Governor's apartment and walked down the streets of Woodbury, each stewing in their own thoughts before Michonne broke the silence.

"I don't trust him."

"Why not?" Andrea asked. "Have you ever trusted anybody?"

"Yeah," Michonne responded as if it were obvious, watching as the man Merle had called Shumpert watch them from down the road.

"Then give this a day or two, that's all I'm asking," Andrea said with a shrug of her shoulders. "Give us some time to get our shit together."

"My shit never stopped being together," Michonne quipped.

"Didn't look that way when Milton asked about your walkers," Andrea shot back, sick of Michonne's standoffish attitude when the Governor had been nothing but charming and kind. "I'm surprised he didn't get a fork in his eye."

"It was none of his damn business."

"I guess it's none of mine, either," Andrea sighed. "Seven months together, all we've been through. I still feel like I hardly know you. I'm sorry, it's the truth. You know everything about me!" she complained.

"You know enough," Michonne told her.

"Those walkers were with us all winter long, protecting us, and you took them out without any hesitation. That had.."

"It was easier than you think," Michonne cut her off before walking off, ever aware of Shumpert's gaze.

~x~

Merle was hiding in the woods watching the Governor talking to the soldiers jovially, waiting for the signal. When the Governor pulled out his handgun and shot the military man in front of him, Merle opened fire as well. In the back of his mind, he couldn't help but think that those were soldiers they should have been recruiting, not killing, but he had his orders. Asking questions would be worse than not following orders, and Merle had learned the hard way once already. He wasn't about to go back into isolation with barely enough food and water to survive for a week just to save lives that weren't his or his brothers, and maybe that girl's.

It didn't take long for them to gun down all the military men, the Governor walking up to the one he gunned down and cutting his gun off of him. He used the damn thing to bust the man's face in. Even Merle knew that the man was half-way off his rocker, but the man had saved his life. That was before his daughter had been bit and he began taking pleasure in the darker dynamics of life. It wouldn't be so bad if he didn't get a hard on every time Chrystal opened her mouth to talk about Titania. Even Merle had his limits, and getting off on hearing about abuse done to a girl anywhere from three years old to seventeen was definitely one of those. He just grimaced and continued to keep his eye on the bodies as the Governor spoke to one of the newer recruits.

"Never waste a bullet, son," he told him. "Pick up the rest of these weapons."

One of the soldiers tried to make a run for it. Rather than shooting him in the head like any of the other men would have, the Governor shot him in the spine. Shumpert, Martinez, and Merle all shared a look of discontent at that as he handed his knife over to the newest scavenger.

"Go put a merciful end to that young man's days," he told him. As the young man ran off, the Governor told the others, "Let's see what Uncle Same brought us, shall we?"

They loaded up the vehicles and weapons and headed back to Woodbury, leaving the bodies of the soldiers behind. Merle quickly got out of one of the vehicles and walked over to the Governor, catching sight of Andrea on the way. The plan was to tell a story, how the military men were heroes and they weren't protected like Woodbury was. Whatever, Merle thought as he walked away, not wanting to hear the lies. He might have to do the Governor's bidding, but he had never been one for lies. Just gotta find my brother and I'll be gone.

~x~

Andrea watched as a convoy of military vehicles entered through the front gate. Joining in with the people of Woodbury, she watched as Milton and Merle walked away before looking over to Michonne. The woman was sitting nonchalantly in a garden chair not too far away, looking at Andrea as if she were angry at being there. The Governor stood on the back of one of the military trucks to gain everybody's attention. Andrea watched in rapt silence as he told them what happened.

"We brought in three new people yesterday. One was a helicopter pilot with a National Guard outfit. Even though he's clinging to life, he told us about his convoy on the highway. His men. I promised I'd bring them back here alive. But they didn't have our walls, or our fences," he told the crowd sadly. "Biters got there before we did. Now, the men had trucks, the trucks had weapons, food, medicine, things we need. Now, we didn't know them, but we'll honor their sacrifice by not taking what we have here for granted. Won't be long before dark, so go on home. Be thankful for what you have. Watch out for each other," he ended, hopping down from the truck bed.

As people began to disperse, he walked up to Andrea, "You're still here."

"Anything I can do?" she asked him.

"No, no, nothing tonight."

"Long day?" she attempted at conversation.

"Haven't had many short ones," he commented, earning her a soft smile; anyone with eyes could see she had the hots for him. "Goodnight," he told her.

"So what's your real name?" she tried once again. "If it's not asking too much."

He turned around and considered her, smiling and flirting with her, "I never tell."

"Never say never," she flirted right back.

He chuckled before taking two steps towards her and leaning in slightly, he smiled before saying, "Never."

He walked away after that, stopping to whisper something to Chrystal who nodded and smiled back at Andrea with a wave. Andrea smiled and waved back, not at all worried about what was said. Probably just checking in as to how she and Michonne had been today. As he turned his back on her, Andrea couldn't help but appreciate the broadness of it and hummed at herself. Walking away, she found Michonne and the two went back to their assigned room. Michonne was talking even less and Andrea was at a loss of what to do.

So, I kinda appropriated a character from the show...XD BUT! There's good reason for it! I promise...just gotta keep reading to find out what...lol...also, hope you guys like what I plan on doing with Merle and how it's starting here. Just wait...I have a lot in store for him...

Updated 9/8/21