I'm aware of waking up before I actually wake up. I don't think that makes sense. But here's what I mean: I know I'm me, and I take a breath, I let it out. It's hard, because my chest feels heavy. Every part of me feels heavy, but I don't really worry about it. And I stay like that for a while, until I remember, bit by bit, like heavy water drops landing in my head, who I've become. Then where I've been . . . Where I am. That's when I wake up, really. But it's hard. I still feel heavy all over, but that's not entirely right, I feel – like I'm underwater. Drowning in those heavy water drops, maybe. Except I can breathe. That's the only relief, and there's not much to be had.

I open my eyes.

White light, and deep dark shadows through the rest of the room. It's night. There's a person over me. A white hand reaching out. I gasp and move away, but the hand is faster. It catches me, but it's not rough.

"Shh," Beth whispers. Her head whips around and then back, too fast for me to really follow. I blink, roll my eyes around, she's still there when I focus back in, focus back in as best as I can. Blurry but there. There, here. My Beth. "Shh," she says again. "It's just me."

"Beth."

And a smile, then a grin, the kind of uncontrollable grin you get when you find someone you loved who you thought you'd never see again. She takes hold of both of my shoulders. "Hey."

"Beth . . ." I try to lift myself up, but it's hard.

"Shh, lie down. You're waking up from a sedative. You're groggy. It'll wear off soon, but you need to rest, okay?"

"I don't –" But I fall back anyway. The pillow I land on is actually pretty soft.

"Sydney, we don't have much time," Beth says. Beth, Beth. "They don't know I know you. I had to sneak in to see you."

I have so many questions, but I can't seem to grab one from my mind. They buzz around, here, there, gone, replaced, here, there, gone. Buzz, buzz, buzz . . .

Wait, wait – got one.

"How long have I been here?"

"Eight and a half hours. I've been keeping track, I . . ."

I wait.

"Your fingers . . ." she whispers.

"Got bit," I say to the ceiling.

She clenches my shoulders harder. I see her nodding, I look right at her, I should take her in as much as I can. No smile on her face anymore, but it's not crumpling. Good.

"How long after did you cut them off?"

"I didn't. My dad did."

Her eyes fly to mine. "Your dad?"

"Yeah."

"He's alive?"

"Yeah." And then I remember there are a whole lot of people she should know are alive. "And Maggie . . . Maggie's alive."

There's that grin again, the happiest of all happy grins, and the wet eyes that come with it. It's intense. I even feel myself smile against the medicine swimming through my body, weighing my muscles down . . . Yeah, I smile against it.

"And Glenn," I say. "Carl, Rick. Michonne. Tyreese and Sasha, Bob . . . and Judith. Judith, Beth. She's alive."

Beth laughs then, and covers her mouth like she shouldn't do that. Maybe this isn't a laughing place. Of course it's not a laughing place. "Are you sure? You've seen them?"

"We're all at church. A ways from here . . . Dad, he saw – he saw a car go by with a white cross. He said it was the kind of car that took you, so we followed it. Dad and Carol and me and Owen."

"Owen?"

"He's –" I don't know how to describe him. Beth said we didn't have much time, anyway. "He's new. He helped me. While we, while we were all separated . . ." I clench my eyes shut, put a hand over them. The light is really bright. "And we came here. And then . . . a lot of stuff happened, then, and . . ." I lift my hand. Two fingers, one thumb. A big gap in the middle. "Carol got hit by a car. I was with her. I don't know where Dad and Owen and the – the guy are." Do I know the guy's name? I can't remember.

"The guy?"

"This, um, this black guy. I think he was a teenager. He took our weapons and then . . . my hand – happened, and then . . . I don't know, I just remember he was with us, then Carol got hit by a car, and Dad and Owen and the guy, I don't know, are they –"

"They aren't here, none of them are here. Syd. Sydney! Was the guy's name Noah?"

"I don't . . . I can't remember, I don't . . . Beth, my hand. My hand, Beth. I might be . . . I don't, I don't know if . . ."

"Okay, it's okay." Her voice is soft again, soothing, a for-Judith voice. "It's okay. You're gonna be fine."

"No . . . No. I was bit . . ."

"But your dad got your fingers off. You don't even have a fever."

"It could be taking its time."

"No. You're gonna be fine." The soothing tone has given way to a forceful one. Like I don't have a choice but to be fine. Ten-year-old Sydney's body might have minded. This Sydney's body doesn't follow orders all that well. "But . . . when the doctor comes in to check on you, don't tell him you were bit."

"Why?" I say, but the answer drip-drops into my head even as Beth says it, reluctantly, but quickly, too, somehow she does both.

"Because . . . this isn't a good place. They might not want to take the risk that –"

"That I'm dying. Turning." My lips managed to move pretty fast for that one.

Beth doesn't answer for a minute. "They don't know what I do," she says finally. "That's you're a Dixon, and Dixons can take just about anything."

"Just about," I repeat, in a dry tone that would make Owen proud. And before Beth can notice or call me out on that bit of dark humor, I say, "Carol, is Carol okay?"

"She –" Beth swallows. "She hasn't woken up."

"Is she going to?"

"Yeah."

"She's going to wake up, and I'm going to be fine," I mutter. "This is a better day than I thought."

"She is going to wake up. And you are going to be fine. And we're gonna get out of here. That guy you met? I think he was my friend. I helped him escape, and that means we can escape. We'll get out of here, and we'll go to that church. I promise. You'll get back to your dad."

Is this really my Beth? The singer, Judith's babysitter, innocent, more innocent than me and Carl, even? Looks like Beth. But the bruises on her face, the hardness in her eyes . . . the world's gotten to that innocence, finally. Drove the last of it away. Makes sense, then. That she's alive. No one still alive is still innocent.

"So we're prisoners?" I say.

She hesitates. "They won't say that. Not straight out. They'll say this is a place where they take in people, and that we have to help them if we want to leave. It isn't like that. But you have to pretend it is. You have to be good, you hear me? You have to let them give you medicine, and you have to do what they tell you to. That's really important, Sydney. Do you hear me?"

I look at the bruises on her face and I say, "Yeah."

She sighs.

"But what about gettin' out of here?"

"Leave that to me."

"My dad," I say. "My dad, if he got away, if he got back to the church, then they'll be coming for us. Dad knows about the hospital, so they'll be coming for us."

Please, God, don't let Carl come.

"Yeah," Beth says, and her eyes go off and she wants to say more, but she doesn't. Not about that. "Your fingers. Say that there was an accident."

"I got one in mind," I say after a second or two.

"What?"

"We had an enemy, my group. He found our hiding spot. He kidnapped me. We fought. He cut off two of my fingers. He had an eyepatch. Where is he? I killed him. I shot him in the back, and I don't give a damn."

Beth stares at me for a long time. "Did you really kill him?" she finally asks.

I backtrack, it's hard, through the thickness. "I shot him in the back . . . I killed him, but he'd hurt us. He was trying to kill Rick, he'd killed . . ."

Silence.

"He killed my dad," Beth says.

I wait for her to cry. She doesn't. Her face is still. Just her eyes are broken. But that hardness is behind the shattered parts. I wonder what's behind the hardness.

"I put him down," I whisper. "Your dad. I found him, and I put him down. I don't know if that makes you feel better or worse. But he's not one of them. I didn't think he would want to be –"

"No." She rubs my arm, but doesn't look at me. Can't. I get it. Hershel has her attention right now. "No . . . Thank you. For doin' that for him. It couldn'ta been easy, but – it was what he would've wanted." Her eyes shut. "What I would've done."

I might not have believed that a few months ago, but I do now. Something's changed in her, something big. Innocence lost, and all that. I know . . . I know . . .

She squeezes my arm one more time. Then she gives me a long look and finally leans down and kisses my forehead. "Everything they say, you do," she tells me again. "And I'll find a way to get you out.

Her warm hand slips away. Coldness remains, absolute ice, and it sears through my arm up to my shoulder and down into me, and it goes straight through my heart, like a frozen arrow. My throat tightens so fast I nearly gag. "Don't go, don't . . ." It's so dark in here, except for the burning white light from the lamp, and somehow that makes it all worse, so much worse.

"Shh," Beth says yet again, and takes my head in both her hands. "Sydney," she says firmly, "We don't get to cry anymore. We all . . . we all got jobs to do. Yours is to blend in. To not draw attention to yourself. That's your job. Okay? Okay?"

I want to throw her hands off. To snarl at her that I'll cry if I damn well want to, because I've been through enough shit, I've earned it.

But I just nod. Let her wipe my tears. Let her go when she turns off the lamp, thank God, let her go when she leaves. The door, the thick kind of wide doors hospitals have, it slams hard behind her. I sink into the covers. I am alone. You think it would be something I'm used to by now. I guess I am. I guess that's the loneliest part.

I pull my disfigured hand – the IV is hooked back into that arm, by the way, but I leave it in, because I'm not supposed to make trouble – I pull my hand up to my face and bring my other hand up to rub it. Hurts. Not as bad as you might expect. I wonder if they've given me painkillers. How many drugs do I have in my blood? Can any of them fix the really big infection? Hell no. So ultimately, what do any of them matter?

I should have asked Beth for some paper and pen. I bet she could have made it happen. I would write my goodbyes. Write them, and Beth and Carol could take them out of here – and yes, Carol, because Carol is going to make it, I know it, I know it. They'll get out, or my dad and the others will get here and get them out, but I'll be gone by then.

Or maybe not. It's been eight hours. You could be fine. You could be totally fine.

I could be. I'm not saying it's impossible. I'm saying it's not how this world works.

"I love you, Dad. I'm sorry. I love you, Carl. I'm sorry. I love you, Judith. I love you, Rick . . . I'm sorry. I love you, Carol. I love you, Glenn. I love you, Maggie . . . Mom. Mama, I love you. I love you . . ."

"Anytime you wanna get to the good stuff," someone says, I think with a yawn, "You go right ahead. I'll wait." He kneels by the bed, crosses his arms on the mattress and rests his chin on them, blinking lazily, Owen to a tee. I would run my hands through his hair, because I love his hair so much, but I know that if I tried I wouldn't feel anything. I know there's nothing by this bed but shadows. But it's nice, sometimes, to let my head lie to me. To see light in the shadows.

"Are you alive?" I murmur.

"No one's gonna kill me but me."

"I'll remember that next time I wanna try."

"You're alive, too."

"For now."

"We're all alive for now. You're no different from the rest of us. Now's all we have, Miss Dixon. So say what you gotta say."

So I look into his shining eyes and tell him I love him and that I'm sorry.

"Me, too," he says, and he's reaching for me when I fall asleep.