RaphaeltheCowboy: Glad to have you back and still meeting your expectations. I can't say too much without giving away the endgame of this ark, but I think you'll enjoy what I have planned out.
FanFicReader47: I'm glad you're enjoying how I'm setting things up. I'm honestly excited to say that the next chapter is going to be the one that blows everything out of the water. Might be up later today since I've got the majority of it written already.
For all those who have been reading so far, thank you for that and I hope you continue to enjoy!
Andrea was walking along the way to Mr. Coleman's to help Milton with the body. She'd stopped in at Philip's office to explain what had happened with Milton's experiment. It had been a complete and total failure and Milton was distressed by that fact. It looked like Philip was upset by the findings as well.
"I promised Milton I'd help him cremate Mr. Coleman's body," she told him in an attempt to leave.
"That's sweet of you, but if you're rattled, he can handle it himself," Philip said.
"He shouldn't have to," Andrea told him. "All these people you've brought together, they're here for more than just protection, they're helping each other through this mess."
"Woodbury's startin' to grow on you, huh?" he asked with a smile. When she didn't answer, just smiled back, he said, "Good." She went to leave, but before she could make it to the door, he called to her, "Send Merle in if you could. His apartment is the fourth down on the third floor. He should be there."
"No problem."
Walking to the stairs, she groaned inwardly at having become Philip's errand girl. She climbed them as slowly as she dared, running into Chrystal on the second floor. It was harder than she thought to keep her face trained into a friendly, casual demeanor rather than look at the woman in disgust. Now that she knew who this woman was and that Merle knew, it was easy to see why Tea had never really talked about her family. They were very good at making people believe their sob stories. She'd almost fallen for it herself until Merle gave her a warning and made her rethink herself. After saying goodbye to Chrystal, she made her way up to Merle's door and knocked on it.
"What?!" came the muffled response.
"Governor wants you," she called to him.
"Fuck's he want now?" the man said as he opened the door and stormed out.
"Wouldn't know."
Whatever the governor wanted, Andrea didn't wait find out. Instead she sauntered around town for a bit, assuming the role of night time patrol. She started ushering people to their homes when the sun went down and enforcing the curfew. It was a good way to pass the time, at least that was until she heard gunshots and a lot of commotion. Merle said shit was going to happen, she thought to herself as she unsheathed her gun and ran towards the wall.
Storming over to Philip when she saw him come out of his office building, she told him, "Shots came from up there. I'm gonna go check it out."
"No, I'll handle it," he said, grabbing her arm. "Sometimes biters get in through the side fence. There's no need for anyone to panic."
"Someone help!" Chrystal called out.
"What happened?" Philip hollered as they walked over.
"Some guys came through with guns," a man sitting on the steps of a house said.
"How many?" Philip asked.
"I, I don't know," came the reply.
"Well, think!"
"Six or seven guys. I've never seen them before."
"Are we under attack? What should we do?" a girl in the gathering crowd asked.
"Hey, hey, hey, hey," Philip said, drawing everyone's attention. "Everyone, please just go home, lock your doors, huh? We need to keep everyone safe. So just get inside, keep your lights off. Come on." The scavengers gathered around him and Andrea as everyone else meandered off. "We're under attack," he told them quietly. "You fan out and you find these people. Don't take any chances, try and take prisoners. You shoot to kill, huh? Come on," he told Andrea.
~x~
Merle was in a foul mood. Between what happened with the China-man and his girl, finding out about Andrea knowing Titania, being grilled about Tea, and then Chrystal coming up and trying to get more information out of him about Daryl's whereabouts, he was beyond livid. Yet now he had to go down to the Governor's office and meet with the man as if he was in the same mood he was always in, a feat he wasn't sure he could accomplish.
Knocking on the man's door and entering, he said, "You rang."
"Yeah, come here," the Governor said, bringing Merle over to look at a map. "The prison's the perfect place to hole up. What once kept prisoners in now keeps biters out. And that's smart."
"You thinkin' of takin' it over? Movin' Woodbury over there?" Merle asked.
"People love it here because it feels like what was. Move them to damp cells surrounded by barbed wire? No. We gotta take out the group that's livin' there. Let the biters move back in. No one'll be the wiser."
"The problem is my brother's with them," Merle said, not liking where this was going. "And his girl, according to Andrea."
"Well, you'll talk to him," the Governor told him, that glint back in his eye that made Merle want to break eye contact. "Make him our inside man. He'll get us in there. We'll wave the white flag like we did with the National Guard."
"Nothin' happens to Daryl," Merle said seriously. "Or his girl. He won't cooperate if she gets it."
"Of course not," the Governor said, but Merle could see the slight smile that graced the man's face, a clear indication of when he lied.
"What about Glenn? And the girl?"
"Well, the longer they're here, the more chance Andrea will find out," the Governor told him. "Take 'em to the screamer pits."
Fuck, time to go, Merle thought to himself. This was not going to be as easy as he was hoping. Now that the order was given, it would be passed along to at least one other person to ensure it got done. Merle looked after the man who walked away and swore to himself he was going to get the three of them out of Woodbury tonight, one way or another. As he walked with a few other scavengers to the torture rooms, he formulated a plan that he hoped would work.
Two of the scavengers opened the door, and Glenn and Maggie rushed out, Maggie now in Glenn's shirt. Glenn had his blade in hand while Maggie was carrying what looked to be a sharp bone. Maggie managed to slice into the jugular of the man she was fighting before Glenn got his man right in the heart, up through the ribs. They'd definitely been given some training on where to aim for the killing blow. As the man Maggie sliced into fell, his finger instinctually clamped down on the trigger of the fully automatic weapon, causing Merle and the other scavenger to drop to the ground in cover. After a scuffle in which more scavengers with more guns came in, the two survivors were forced onto their knees.
Merle watched as Martinez walked in with sacks over his arm and the lovers held hands. Glenn told her to keep looking at him while she said she loved him right before a sack was placed over her head. He looked heart broken when the bag was placed on his. They were being gathered up to be taken to the walker pits when Merle got ready to make his move. The last thing he expected was to be pelted with a smoke bomb and pulled along with the scavengers in the ensuing commotion.
He got swept up in the movement, not even sure of what he was looking for until he found himself at Milton's lab. Barging in, he found Andrea and most of the inner circle and a few scavengers waiting. The rest were out patrolling the street.
"Any sign of them?" the Governor asked him.
"Signs of what?" Milton asked, having been holed up in his lab the entire time. "What exactly is happening out there?"
"Some asshole wants what we have," Merle responded looking at Andrea.
"Then what are we doing waiting around here?" Andrea asked, picking up on his premise after their conversation.
"Damn straight," Merle agreed, both knowing full well he was meaning that survivors of their original camp were around. "Let's take these sons a bitches out."
"How do we know that the perimeter was breached?" Milton asked. "Did anyone actually see them?"
"They killed Warren, and Junior," Merle answered.
"Killed?"
"Holy shit," one of the only other girls in the scavengers said.
"Got up close, one stuck a stake through Warren's neck, the other stabbed Junior in the heart with his own knife," Merle told them.
"We need patrols now!" Philip said worriedly. "Can't take chances with these terrorist! You check on our people," he told Andrea. "Make sure they're safe."
"You want me to do house calls? Make sure everyone's tucked in?"
"These guys could be holed up in one of our residences. They could be holding someone captive. Or worse."
"Can't anyone else handle that? I've got a hell of a lot of experience and-"
"Thank you," he said, cutting her off. "The rest of you split up! Merle will lead the search."
He walked away, only for Andrea to chase after him, grabbing his arm to make him look at her, "Don't you think Haley should handle the door-to-doors? She's the youngest here!"
"I need someone with some authority to provide reassurance. You've been talking to the townsfolk according to Merle, and they get on well with you. I mean, she's just a kid. She can't do what you can."
"These people have already killed two men, beaten another. I'm good with a gun-"
"Just do as I ask," Philip told her.
She looked at him before just saying, "Sure."
She left Milton's lab just as all hell broke loose. Andrea could see that there were people in the smoke and took aim. While she couldn't tell who they were, she could tell that there were more than five or six. She only hoped that whatever Merle had planned, it wouldn't be as bad as it was starting to seem. Philip walked out amidst the gunfire and over to her asking if she was alright.
"I saw them," she told him. "One of them, at least. Black guy, young. Looked like he was wearing a prison jumpsuit."
"Escaped convicts!" Philip exclaimed. After a few more shots, he told her, "We gotta get off the streets. We're not soldiers, we're survivors. We'll wait 'em out. You get off the street!"
"Where are you going?" Andrea called after him as he left her standing there.
~x~
She was crouched down between Daryl and Rick watching the wall like they were. This town was well guarded, she had to admit that. As they sat there assessing the situation, Michonne left. Rick quietly called after her, but Tea told him to leave her be. With or without her, they were getting their people back. They began downsizing, leaving their packs hidden behind the vehicle they were at now and taking their guns, bows, ammo and as many of the grenades as they could carry in their pockets and a single backpack.
"Ain't no way we're gonna check in all them buildings," Daryl said. "Not with all them guards there."
"Prolly won' have ta. She said this is a town. Most a this area's prolly residential. We need ta find the non-residential area, the area where they do the dirty work they don' want the townsfolk ta see," Tea presumed.
"How sure are you on that?" Rick asked her.
"'Bout as sure as I'm gonna get out 'ere and not in there. Once we get in there, might change a few things, but that's me guess for now."
"Alright, then. Let's get in, find an area like what Tea said, search that," Rick told the group.
When a twig snapped behind them, all four members of the prison group turned with guns raised, ready to go down in a hail of gunfire. Breaths were released as Michonne reappeared and motioned for them to follow her. They took one final look at the wall, Daryl looking to Ania quickly, before Rick had them moving. Following Michonne, they found a small opening in the wall's security that allowed them to carefully peel back one of the metal sections and crawl through the gate. Michonne led them through the town to the back door of a house, climbing through the unlocked lower half. They entered into the room and looked around, ready for anything that came their way.
"This is where you were held?" Rick asked.
"I was questioned," Michonne corrected.
"Any idea where else they could be?"
Tea and Daryl walked over to the windows ahead of the others, Tea kneeling down and carefully peeling back the corner of the curtain. Through it, she could see people still in the streets. When Michonne walked up with Rick, she turned to the woman with a slight glare.
"I thought ya said there was a curfew!"
"The street's are packed during the day. Those are stragglers," Michonne promised.
"If anyone comes in here, we're sitting ducks," Rick noted. "We gotta move."
"They could be at his apartment," Michonne suggested.
"Yeah? What if they ain't?" Daryl asked her heatedly.
"Then we'll look somewhere else," Michonne told him evenly.
"You said you could help us," Rick started.
"She's doin' what she can, Rick," Tea said before asking Michonne. "Is there any place they keep secret from the citizens. Someplace they don' want the every day people seein'?"
Rick called Daryl over to him when she didn't answer, Tea moving with them, much to his chagrin. Oscar came too, leaving Michonne alone. Pulling them to an area far enough away for the woman to be unable to hear, he looked at them all seriously.
"If this goes south, we're cutting her loose," he told them.
"You think she's leading us into a trap?" Oscar asked.
"Right now, it's the blind leading the blind," Daryl commented. "Let's split up."
A knock on the door had them all facing it on high alert and killed the comment on the tip of Tea's tongue. They quickly hid as they heard the sound of keys. Daryl pulled Ania to crouch beneath him as he huddled over her while Rick was on the other side of the door frame to the room they were in. Neither had seen where Oscar and Michonne had managed to hide.
"I know you're in here," a male voice rang out. "I saw you movin' from outside. Alright now. You're not supposed to be in here and you know it. Who's in here?"
As the voice got closer to them, Daryl pressed even further down on her until Rick jumped up and grabbed the man, followed by Daryl and Tea moving as a single unit, standing and aiming at him from different angles. Between the gun in Rick's hand and two crossbows being held in his face, the man kept his trap shut after the initial shocked yell.
"Shut up. Get on your knees," Rick told him roughly. "Hands behind your back. Zip tie him," he told Tea as Daryl and him kept the man trained in their sights. "Where are our people?"
"I don't know! I don't know!" the man insisted.
"You are holding some of our people! Where the hell are they?"
"Rick! I already told ya! The every day citizens prolly don' even know this Governor has 'em! Let up!" Tea reprimanded him.
Considering her words, he told the man to open his mouth before stuffing a clean rag in it. The man started grunting like he was trying to say something, but as soon as Tea stepped back from getting his hands and feet zip-tied, Daryl brought the butt of his crossbow down on the man's head. Tea sighed and shook her head, knowing they couldn't leave the man conscious, but wishing they could have been maybe a bit gentler about it. The guy was seemingly getting on in years.
They were just about to leave the building and go look for this Governor's apartment Michonne had mentioned when gunfire rang out. They used the distraction to leave out the front of the building as those outside ran for the wall or cover. Following the sound, the group made it to an industrial looking area that was made more like what the wall was than the town. A large commotion was happening inside and they could hear shouting. Tea stayed between Daryl and Rick, her obviously assigned position so that the two men could ensure her protection. Crouching down under a window, the quintet listened to the talking going on in the other room. Daryl carefully peaked above Tea's head through the window. They didn't have much warning as shadows fell over his face and the group was forced into action.
Rick nodded to Michonne, who went off in the other direction while he, Daryl, Oscar, and Tea grabbed smoke bombs, tear gas, and a flash bang. Daryl and Tea both threw smoke bombs while Oscar and Rick threw one of each of the others. The flash bang went off first, followed by the smoke and tear gas. There was so much shouting and commotion Tea was astounded someone hadn't started firing yet. Taking the chance, she rounded the corner, Rick hot on her heels, and looked into the chaos and smoke. Holding her breath, she reached in and grabbed a hold of Maggie while Rick grabbed Glenn. It was then that they were noticed and shots started being fired.
Tea ripped the bag off Maggie's head and handed her one of the two rifles she had with her before whipping around and firing off a couple shots into the gas as those who stayed in it began firing at them. Rick helped support Glenn who was having a hard time breathing thanks to a kick one of the men had given him during their fight for freedom. They used the commotion outside to run through the town in relative peace. Looking ahead, Tea noticed men with guns starting to come their way and she ushered the group into an unlocked house. She and Daryl entered first, guns raised to make sure the coast was clear. Glenn stumbled in with Maggie checking on him, Rick and Oscar entering behind them. Michonne, however, simply closed the door on them without entering the house.
"Shite," Tea huffed.
"Ain't no way out back here," Daryl said.
"How did you guys find us?" Maggie asked.
"How bad are you hurt?" Rick asked Glenn.
"Less than it looks. Just got a bad kick to my ribs right before all this. I'll be alright," he answered.
"Where's that woman?" Maggie asked.
"Shut the door behind us and took off," Tea answered.
"Maybe she was spotted," Oscar offered.
"Want me to go look for her?" Daryl asked.
"No, we gotta get outta here," Tea answered him. "She'll eitha catch up, be back, or go."
"Daryl, Merle. Merle was trying to help," Glenn told him as Maggie helped him into a sweater. Both Tea and Daryl stopped what they were doing to look at him. "He was."
"You saw him?" Rick asked.
"Face to face. He did this to my face, but he gave me a knife. He, he tried to help Maggie. He was going to help us get out of there when you guys showed up."
"S-so my brother's this governor?" Daryl asked, shocked at learning his brother was alive.
"No, he's somebody else. Your brother's like his lieutenant or something, but he really was trying to help us get outta here. Shoulda taken his advice and just run when he told me to back at the store. His posse, though, they're not right in the head," Maggie said, painting a confusing image of Merle in both the hunters' minds.
"Does 'e know we're still with ya?" Tea asked.
Maggie nodded her head while Glenn said, "He does now. Rick, Tea, I'm sorry. We told him where the prison was. We couldn't hold out. We tried."
"Don'. No apologizin' for doin' what ya need ta ta survive," Tea said as Rick leaned down and squeezed the man's hand comfortingly.
"They're gonna be lookin' for us," Maggie said, her nerves clearly shot.
"We have to get back," Rick told her before asking Glenn, "Can you walk? We got a car a few miles out."
"I'm good," Glenn asked, accepting Maggie and Rick's help to get up.
"Hey, if Merle's around, I need to see him!" Daryl said.
"Not now. We're in hostile territory," Rick said, looking him in the eye.
"He's my brother. I ain't gonna-"
"We don't have time for this. Look at Glenn. That has to be our priority," Rick cut him off.
"Maybe I can talk to him. Maybe I can work something out!" Daryl insisted, Tea behind him and completely agreeing.
"No, no, no, you're not thinking straight," Rick said. "Look, no matter what they say, they're hurt. Glenn can barely walk. How are we going to make it out if we get over run by walkers and this governor catches up to us? I need you. Both of you," he said, making sure to look at Tea over Daryl's shoulder. "Are you with me?"
They both looked at him and said yes, but also shared a look that said they would just wait for the chance. No way in hell, after all these months, were they leaving Merle behind again. Especially not after what Glenn had just said. As Rick instructed the others the plans on getting out, she and Daryl knelt down next to the bag of bombs, pulling out as many of the smokers as they could and prepping them to be thrown. Rick counted down from three before opening the door, Tea and Daryl letting their bombs fly. They waited for the smoke from the three bombs to build up.
"Let's go," Rick said.
They were almost immediately spotted, and Tea wasted no time in taking aim at the nearest guard, gunning him down before he could raise his weapon and turning to the next, who was already shooting, and repeating the action. Nine, she counted. As fire broke out around them, she took aim at a man aiming towards Maggie, ten. She couldn't tell what the others were doing, she could only keep going, injuring another man in the shoulder.
"Behind you!" she heard Daryl yell as he took fire.
She turned and caught another man in the leg before putting a bullet in his head, eleven. Rick was yelling for them to get cover, and by the gods they were trying. Thankfully the smoke was making it as difficult for the citizens of Woodbury to shoot at them, or else this entire thing would have been suicide. They managed to make it into an overlay of a store with stone walls, providing them just enough cover to reload.
"How many?" Rick growled.
"Don't know. Couldn't count," Oscar told him.
"Don't matter. There's gonna be more of 'em," Daryl said. "We need to move!"
"Any grenades left?" Rick said, earning a positive from Tea and Daryl as the three huddled over the bag. "Get 'em ready. We gotta gun it to the wall."
"You guys go ahead. I'm gonna lay down some cover fire," Daryl said.
"I'll stay too," Ania nudged him.
"Like hell you will," Daryl told her with a scowl, looking at her too calm face.
"Where ya go, I go, already told ya that," she said with a knowing look.
She knew, again, of course she fucking knew. He was going to lay cover fire, sure, but he was also going to look for Merle. They both knew it was something he had to do, even if Rick didn't understand. Rick didn't have to, because he wasn't the one who had to make things right. He'd had his chance and blew it with Lori; Ania understood that Daryl wasn't going to pass up on his. And she was going to make sure he managed to get it, too. That's just how she was.
"No! We gotta stay together!" Maggie insisted.
"Too hairy, Mags," Tea told the frightened woman. "We'll be right behind ya."
"Ready?" Daryl yelled.
He took two more smoke bombs and threw them out towards the people that were firing on them. Tea, Daryl, and Rick fanned out in front of the rest while they went to the bus in an attempt to make it over the wall. Tea couldn't help but notice from the corner of her eye as Rick froze; a man similar enough in characteristics coming through the smoke was the cause. Tea took no time in once again taking aim, twelve. She corrected her aim and made her way over to him using her back to push him towards the bus before walking a few steps forward, all while never letting up on her firing. She managed another head shot before everything went to hell. It seemed like forever until she heard Rick screaming for her and Daryl. When Daryl didn't answer, she hollered for him herself, only for her gun to jam and a stinging sensation to pass by her left bicep.
It was only a few minutes later that she found herself tackled to the ground by a Hispanic man, "Holy shit, it's a girl!"
That was all he managed to get before she reared her head right up into his nose, hopefully breaking it. Using his momentary lack of vision, she bucked her hips up high, throwing the man off balance and allowing her a chance to roll out from under him as she rendered him incapable of vertical movement. Her freedom was short kept as a tall black man held the muzzle of a gun to her face. She was picked up, stripped of her weapons, bound, gagged, and had a bag placed over her head. It seemed like she sat in that room for the longest time before she was taken from her seat and dragged into what seemed to be a loud area. She hadn't seen nor heard hide nor hair of Daryl and the anxiety she felt at that had begun to outweigh any survival instinct she usually felt.
~x~
Carl and the others were sitting in the cell block reloading magazines. Sophia had just returned from walking with her mom, leaving Carl with Beth. Even though he was sad about his own mom, he was happy Sophia had hers. She'd already lost her dad, so it wouldn't be very fair if she lost both. Though, he supposed Tea would gladly take up the role. She was already like a cool older sister to the three younger members of the group and had done her best to include them every step of the way as well as teach them anything she thought was useful. He was just happy he got out of diaper duty with his sister; Tea had shown Beth and Sophia how to change and wash the reusable diapers for Judith.
Speaking of, Hershel was entering the room, "Finally got Judith to sleep."
"How are we with formula?" he asked.
"We have enough to last us another month," the man replied.
"I'll take Carol for some more at the end of the week," he said.
"Your dad and the others will be back by then," Beth told him.
Carl just gave her a look, unable to help the helplessness that was swimming inside him over the loss of his mother, "We don't know that. Right now, Judith is the only family I got. Tea would want us to plan ahead, like she always did. Prepare for the worst, hope for the best."
Any response was killed as what sounded like screams sounded from deep within the prison. "What was that?" Beth asked.
"That came from inside the prison," Sophia said as she was the closest to the door to the tombs.
"Maybe Carol?"
"She's out keeping watch in the guard tower with Axel," Hershel said.
"What if they came back in for something?" Beth asked. "What if they're in trouble?"
"Just check the tower and see if they're there," Hershel reassured her.
"I was just out there and took them water and extra magazines," Sophia told her.
"How could anyone get in?" Beth worried.
"The tombs are filled with walkers that wandered in from outside," Hershel said. "Someone else could have done the same thing."
"I'm going," Carl said.
"Me too," Sophia quickly agreed.
"I can't let you go down there," Hershel told them, holding his crutch out to stop them.
"My father would go, Tea too," Carl simply told the man, earning him a look of understanding.
They held their flashlights at the ready, faced forward in a hand under their gun arm as they slowly followed the sound of screams. Stopping to read a sign and trying to get a sense of direction, a walker managed to sneak up on them. If it hadn't have been for it's snarling, they wouldn't have ever registered it. Sophia ducked down as Carl took it out, both of them standing and staring at it for a moment before huffing and continuing on. Entering the room the walker had busted out of, they found the cause of all the noise.
On the ground, a man had a woman with a clear bite mark on her arm in his while a large black man and a smaller black woman were trying desperately to fight off a group of ten walkers. Sophia killed the walker the woman was struggling while Carl took out a walker by the man on the floor. All of the living looked up and over at the little kids who had just helped them.
"Come on," Sophia told them.
"Let's go," Carl ushered, quickly leading them back through the tombs.
The man with the bit woman in his arms struggled to keep up even with the walkers bearing down on them. The big black man went up and grabbed her, all while the kids were telling them they needed to hurry. The woman killed a walker with a shovel and then shouted for the kids to look out. Turning around, they killed three walkers that were coming up on the group in quick order before rounding on the people.
"You have to leave her!" Carl told them.
"No way," the black man said, punching a walker before Carl shot it.
He hefted the woman onto his shoulder and the group of six quickly made their way back to the commons. By the time they got there, it was too late for the woman who'd been bit. Carl and Sophia looked at each other, Carl being the one to go up and offer to take care of it. He'd already done it once, right?
When he was stopped by the people they'd just save, he looked at them dryly, "She doesn't have that long."
"Who the hell are you?" the other woman asked. "How did you get in here? Who are you with?"
"Look," Sophia said. "We can help you. But first things first."
"No, we take care of our own," the big black man said.
"No! Tyreese-" the grieving man said.
"I gotta do it," Tyreese said. "Look, just take Ben and lean against the wall. It'll be quick."
The grieving man walked over to his son and held onto him as Carl and Sophia walked to the cell block. Unlocking the door, they entered it and relocked it behind them, effectively locking the newcomers into the commons alone. Their movements had gone largely unnoticed until the door closed.
"Hey, what are you doing?" the woman asked.
"Kids," Tyreese said, going over and seeing another young girl in the cells with the kids. "Did you just lock us in here?"
"Open the door!" the woman next to him yelled.
"That room is secure. You'll be safe," Carl told them. "You have food and water."
The woman walked up to the door looking extremely pissed off. "Open this door," she said as if it was a mother talking to her child right before she blew up.
"I can't," Carl said.
Desperation took over as she pleaded, "Come on, man. We're not animals. Don't do this." Noticing Hershel who made no motion to come to help, she banged on the door and rattled it angrily. "You can't just leave us in here! Open this door! Open it! Now!"
Tyreese came up and grabbed the woman away, "Sasha! Back away from their door and let the man go." When she took a few breaths, calming from the near hysteria she was in, he continued. "Look around you. This is the best we've had it in weeks. His house, his rules. We've got other things to do," he said, looking behind him before looking back at the kids. "We don't want any trouble."
"Shouldn't we help them?" Beth asked.
"We did," Sophia said, thinking about what Tea would do. Probably wouldn't leave them to deal with the woman themselves, but she would definitely not let them in the cell blocks until she was certain of them. "I wish I was more like Tea. She'd be able to tell if they were good or not."
"Yeah, but we're not her, so we'll just keep an eye on them," Carl agreed.
~x~
Michonne left the group of survivors after they had their people back. She'd promised to help them and she had. Knowing of Tea from before was just a nice surprise, nothing more, nothing less. While Michonne was appreciative of what the girl had done for her, it didn't change her reasons for coming back to Woodbury. The Governor had tried to kill her, and she was going to repay that debt.
Breaking into his apartment, she sat behind his desk and waited for the man to return. It was the thudding that came from the locked room she'd discovered before that made her move. She'd never managed to unlock it before, and this time she just didn't care. Kicking the door open, she was disturbed at the sight of walker heads in fish tanks, including the pilot, Wells, and her two walkers. They were all still alive too. But that wasn't even the most disturbing thing. In a cage, a little girl was being kept.
Michonne opened the cage and let the girl out, sorrow at seeing the girl with a bag over her head and bound in a straight jacket. The girl seemingly carefully stepped out of the cage and up to Michonne, who realized she even had a damn collar and chain around her neck. Unhooking the chain and letting it drop, she gently removed the bag from her head. All the concern drained from her face and turned into shock as the girl began struggling against her bonds and snarled; he'd kept a damn walker, a little girl walker! She forced the girl to show her her back while picking up her sword, not wanting to look at the face of the walker as she put it down.
"No!" the Governor shouted just as she was about to strike. She looked up and saw he had a gun on her, strategically placing the walker girl in front of her and visibly making the man waver, "Don't hurt her. Look, hey," he quickly stated, making a show of putting his gun away and taking the entire holster off, tossing it away. "It's me you want. There's no need for her to suffer."
Michonne looked at the man who was out of his mind, "She doesn't have needs."
"Please," he pleaded desperately, "Don't hurt my little girl. Please don't."
Michonne found it hard not to feel for the man. But she had hardened her heart nearly a year ago after what she'd had to do and now, this man was refusing to do it. Her sword was pushed through the walker's mouth as the Governor shouted. He threw her around the room and punched her several times before she had much chance to retaliate. Managing to straddle her, the Governor roared as he tried to strangle her, only breaking his hold when she got a hold of her sheath and shoved it up into his throat. She kicked him and then straddled him from behind, using her sheath as a means to choke him out instead.
The Governor managed to get on his feet, forcing Michonne to hers as well, and ran backwards into a wall. She was able to punch him a few times in the gut which he responded to by ramming her head back into the wall several times. When his thumb got too close to her mouth, she bit it, causing him to yell again and send her head first into one of the fish tanks. He held her there until she fought back so hard she brought down two more tanks, sending water and glass everywhere. The man put her in a choke hold and tried to get her to one of the faces still snapping away on the ground, but she elbowed him to escape right at the last minute. Michonne struggled to reach her sword, but the Governor put her in a choke hold again while using his body weight to keep her from moving.
Michonne was running out of time and options. Noticing a particularly large piece of glass still attached to a fish tank laying within reach, she fought to reach it. Grasping it in her hand and cutting through her palm, she managed to break it off from the tank's frame. She flailed widely, only knowing she found purchase somewhere on his face and breaking the glass off in it as he released her. Rolling away, Michonne picked up her katana and sheath, readying herself for the killing strike when the sound of a gun clicking and someone shouting no forced her to turn around.
Andrea was standing there, gun aimed at Michonne, looking every bit as shocked as Michonne was. Keeping each other at point with their weapons, they slowly circled each other until Michonne was at the door and Andrea was by the Governor. Something had changed, though, Michonne noticed, as Andrea gave her a critical look and nodded toward the door, clearly telling her to leave. Michonne couldn't understand what had happened to make Andrea change her tune, but leave she did.
Andrea looked around the room at all the walker heads in disgust. Philip was sitting on the ground cradling a child walker. It took a long time to get him to let go and then even longer to drag him to the building they were using as a hospital. The doctor took out the glass and assessed the damage, bandaging his head to keep the gauze in place. When she'd done everything she could, Andrea asked the doctor for a moment of privacy.
"What the hell was that? Why was she here? Why were you fighting her?"
"She came back to kill me," he said.
"Why?"
"You tell me," he said before spitting blood into a basin. "You knew her."
Andrea realized he was trying to blame her for Michonne's actions when they were more his fault than hers to begin with. Diverting the subject from her friend, she asked, "The fish tanks? The heads?"
"I made myself look at them. Prepared me for the horrors outside," Philip explained quietly, still facing away from her.
"And Penny?" Andrea asked softly.
The weight of her loss had the man stumbling for support as Milton barged in. "Oh my god," the bespectacled man said. "I just heard. Are you alright? Your eye, is it-"
The door opened again as Merle and Haley ran in, "What happened to you?"
When the Governor turned around and landed his eyes on Merle, it sent a shiver up both his and Andrea's back as he said, "I was attacked."
"They made it over the wall," Merle told him. "I'll go after them in the morning."
The Governor just stared at him, making Merle really uncomfortable. In the morning, he was getting out of here and heading to that prison. He knew where it was now, hell, he'd served time there once or twice. All he needed to do was to get outside the walls and he'd do what he had to with the others he took or separate from them somehow.
A little while later, the Governor had called for an emergency gathering at the fighting rink. The entire town was there minus the Governor and a few of the scavengers. Merle was waiting around with the inner circle, assuming like the rest that the meeting was to let the townsfolk know about the attack. Everyone was getting antsy as the Governor finally sauntered in, quieting the murmuring crowd with his mere presence.
"What can I say?" he told the people. "Hasn't been a night like this since the walls were completed. And I thought we were past this. Past the days when we all sat huddled, scared in front of the TV during the early days of the outbreak. The fear we all felt then, we felt it again tonight. I failed you," he said quietly. "I promised to keep you safe. Hell, look at me. You know I—I should tell you that we'll be okay, that we're safe. That tomorrow we'll bury our dead and endure. But I—I won't. Because I can't. Because I'm afraid. That's right. I'm afraid of terrorists who want what we have! Want to destroy us! Worse, because one of those terrorists is one of our own!" The crowd started murmuring again as the Governor pointed his finger behind him, "Merle!" Oh shit, said man thought as he felt a gun placed on his spine by Martinez and watched Shumpert pointed a familiar looking crossbow at him, two of the other scavengers coming over and removing his weapons. "Merle," the Governor repeated, "the man I counted on, the man I trusted. He led them here!" The crowd gasped at the accusation. "And he let 'em in. It was you. You lied and betrayed us all!"
As Merle was pushed into the ring, two people were being dragged into the room itself. They were brought to the center of the room, Merle recognizing them immediately and going stone faced. It might have been eight months since he'd seen his baby brother, but there was no way he wouldn't recognize the man even if his face was covered. And Tea, that little spitfire was cussing up a storm as two scavengers literally had to haul her off her feet to get her to move, but every time they did, she'd kick at them, making it a difficult task to keep her restrained even as her hands were confined behind her back. How short she was combined with the amber hair that hung beneath the sack were enough to tell him who it was even without all the fuss she was kicking up.
"These are two of the terrorists," the Governor said as he pointed to the pair. The scavengers let go of Daryl, who tried to get to where Tea was, but was grabbed around the bicep by the Governor, who ripped the bag off his head as Tea's was ripped off by Martinez. "Merle's own brother and sister!"
Tea and Daryl looked at him as if they'd seen a ghost, the fight leaving Tea for all of two seconds before it returned with a vengeance. It took Martinez putting his gun to her head for her to freeze as Daryl was released from the Governor's grip. She was breathing hard, noticing how his shirt had been ripped open at the top and he'd obviously been roughed up. Her lip was split and her ribs ached, but it wasn't anything she couldn't handle. In fact, she'd laughed during the entire thing, which had left Martinez a little bit disturbed. It hadn't mattered how hard he'd punched her. She'd just laughed like a maniac the entire time or shouted profanities and threats at him and the other men, following through on some of the threats when she busted the ties holding her wrists.
"So what should we do with them, huh?" the Governor asked, egging the crowd on as it called for their deaths.
Tea looked around and over to Daryl who looked at her still in the clutches of two men with a third holding a gun to her head. They both looked at Merle who gave Daryl a once over, not bothering with the woman behind him. Merle gave Daryl a hard look, one Daryl knew all too well from their childhood before their mother had died and Merle took off. It was the look he'd given him when they were younger and their father barged through the door, drunkenly ranting and berating their mother before it turned into the sounds of fists hitting flesh. He was trying to come up with a plan to get them out of there, but Daryl had to wonder if he was including Ania in that plan.
"You wanted your brother," the Governor said, walking up to Merle. "Now you got 'im."
Updated 9/9/21