Chapter 65: Ambush


DPOV

~Under 48 hours ago~

Walking behind Rick and a few of the others, I was mostly keeping to myself, as I was far too focused on taking my bike and Abraham was with Sasha in the rusted old car. Pushing my bike there for a while, I decided to walk beside Kat for a few minutes as she began to slow down once talking to her father briefly. "I got my job, what's yours?" I asked her, curious to find out what she'd been assigned.

I had the most dangerous job, which was that I was to lead the herd away from home. Kat was tagging along, mostly to help her dad or possibly to look out for someone in the group. Mostly, Glenn, seeing as she stuck beside him like a mother watching her child for the longest time. "Whatever my dad wants me to do," Kat answered bluntly.

"Although, I can't leave Glenn with Nicholas alone. Maggie doesn't trust him," she informed me of the other half of her plan. A plan I was sure she hadn't yet discussed with her father about.

Glancing ahead, I saw Nicholas was sticking close to a few others from Alexandria but was hardly beside Glenn. He'd walk beside him a couple of times but it was nothing to suggest he was trying to get close to the member of our group. "She's got every right not to," I grumbled. "I don't trust him with you either," I put my own vibe across that I felt around him.

Kat had looked at me a little perplexed. Like what I'd just said made no sense to her. Of course I didn't trust the guy. He tried to kill Glenn, killed Noah and almost killed Kat in the process. "Hey, I'm a capable girl, I can look after myself," Kat was sure of herself.

Not looking at her, I stared ahead and kept walking beside her. "Never said you couldn't," I agreed with her statement. "But you did get knocked out by him," I pointed out for her.

Regardless how good she was at surviving, she still put her guard down around him once and it could happen again. "That was one time and it was because he caught me off guard once," Kat defended herself. "That won't happened a second time," she was determined to not let herself slip up again with Nicholas around.

A few minutes of silence had passed between us. "You're going to be leading this herd away from us...that's kind of terrifying," she said with some caution in it. She was leading up to something and I knew it. "So please, be safe," she pleaded of me.

"Always am," I reassured her I would be. "I'll find my way back, always do," I was sure of this. Every time we had been separated in any way, we found our way back to one another. Although, I was a good tracker, I knew how to find my way back home regardless where I was.

Except, when I realised my phrasing of words, I instantly knew that Kat would tease me for it. "You sound more and more like me every day," she teased me, gasping as she grinned widely at me.

She was adorable when she got like this but I had to be strong and try not to make it as awkward as I was feeling with her there and then. She was sweet but I didn't know how to act around her when she got like this. Staying silent, I let it pass as I looked ahead and not at her. "Stay safe out here tomorrow, alrigh'?" I asked of her.

Thinking of losing her again, it wasn't something I wanted to picture. "Always am," Kat used the same words I had only moments ago.

Fighting a smile, my eyes squinting as my body did its best not to react the way Kat would want me to. She possibly expected me to get super carefree with her but that wasn't who I was. "Now who's sounding like who?" I threw back at her a little playfully.

"So you do have a funny bone in your body!" Kat exclaimed, her smile stretched across her features and made her look sweet from the corner of my eyes.

I liked seeing her like this. Seeing her happy and looking like she was content on being around me. Looking ahead, I stopped to get on my bike. "C'mon. Keep up," I encouraged her but knew that the second I'd ride off to catch up with Sasha and Abraham, she wouldn't be capable of catching up with me.

I swore as I rode off, I could hear her laughing after me and telling me I was a cheater. It made me chuckle and smile at the thought that Kat was somehow happy by our stupid interaction. Heading to meet with Abraham and Sasha, I had a glance in the mirror to see the others were far away from me.


PRESENT DAY...DPOV

We were riding out for what had practically been hours, making sure that the walkers that were following us, stayed following us. "Alright," I heard Sasha through the walkie talkie.

It must have been the right amount of distance we had taken to remove the problem of the walkers out of the way. "That's 20?" I asked her, meaning that if we finally hit the miles we needed to, we could finally turn back around and go home.

"It will be. 642 is a mile ahead," Sasha informed me of just how much more was left until the turnoff. "We gotta put distance between us and them before the turnoff," I couldn't have agreed more with her.

"So floor it," Abraham encouraged me to pick up a bit more speed, so the walkers were at a safe enough distance from us.

Glancing behind me through the mirror, I could see the huge line of walkers that followed us out here, soon enough, we would be turning back and going home. Back to Kat, back to Carl, Judith, Rick and Carol. Back to those who mattered to me. "Alright, try to keep up," I teased them a little.

Before I could see it, I already could hear the smile on Sasha's face through the radio. "Daryl, have you looked at this car?" she let out a chuckle. "Believe me, we want to get back there, too," she could tell I was eager to get back home, to find out what happened and if everyone made it back.

Racing past, I finally got close enough to the turning point and when I turned the corner, I was ready to go back. Eager to go back, was what I was. Abraham and Sasha were close behind and suddenly gunfire came up from all sides behind us, beside us. A group of men were firing at us, at the car. Tripping, I slid off my bike and did my best to get back up.

Seeing Sasha and Abraham race off, away from the men shooting at us, away from me, I got on my bike and raced away from them. Glancing behind me as they were shooting at me, both cars were chasing me down and another had followed Sasha and Abraham. Dodging their bullets, eventually, I came across a small cluster of walkers. Dodging them, slipping past them, one of the cars following me crashed and the other didn't do the same mistake that one did.

Racing past them, I did my best to lose them, eventually, I had waited behind bushes for it to pass by me. As soon as I saw them leave, I slipped through to the other side of the road, back into the woods and hoped to find my way back to Abraham and Sasha. Exhausted, my bike eventually slowed and I collapsed off of it.

Lifting my head, it was trees that surrounded me, my bike resting on its side as I laid out, flat on my back. A sharp pain on my arm from the fall I had scraped and burned the skin badly. A growl to my right made me become alert, about to jump up and fight, I looked to the direction of the growl and saw a walker, burnt to nothing and wearing a helmet that had more than likely melted onto him.

I was safe and alone. For now.


KPOV

Waking up that morning, I had expected to be woken up by Enid, telling me it was my turn to watch. Instead, I had awoken to the sounds of the door shaking, the desk scraping across the ground. A couple of walkers had been growling at the door.

As I tried to regather my senses, I called to Enid but got no answer. I should have known better. Each thud got louder, hands were clawing to get inside as the desk eventually got pushed and the walkers slipped in. Getting to my feet in a hurry, I reached for my bow. Aiming each arrow up, I shot at one, killing it and making the other one trip as it followed behind it.

A bang at the door startled me a little, as a walker growled and reached for me, having entered the exact moment the other began crawling over to me. Turning, I had struggled against it, dropping my bow and arrow, it grabbed hold of my shoulders and went to bite me. Shoving it back as best as I could, I used my foot to knock it onto one knee. My heart pounding, I slammed the walker's head against the desk. Once. Twice. Three times. Cracking his head, it stopped its growling and snarling by my hands.

Taking a few steps back, I had seen the one walker left that entered from the back making its best attempt to get to his feet as it crawled to me. Panting, I took out my knife and ended the walker with a fatal blow to the head with a single stab. Getting to my knees, I began to gut the walker, smearing all his guts to the places of exposed skin. Retrieving my bow and arrows, I got to my feet one more.

Deciding to keep safe by keeping my scent masked, I couldn't risk the herd still being out there and getting devoured now. I had began investigating the area and was making it my personal duty to find Enid and take her back to Alexandria. Tracking her down, I eventually came across her trail. It appeared she had dropped water and had someone chasing after her, someone was following her.

For a few hours, I had been tracking her and her stalker. The guts on my skin was slowly beginning to dry and no longer take the effect I hoped it would hold onto for a while longer. If it wasn't dry, then my sweat was cleaning the guts and gunk away from my skin. Approaching the back alley to a diner, I knew I was getting close. Using my bow machete, I killed the few walkers that got far too close, telling me that they knew I was alive, rather than dead.

Hearing a door open, two of the walkers at the further end of the alley had growled and turned to face the sound that caught their attention, no longer interested in me as I approached them. Taking out my bow, I raised it and aimed for one, shot and killed it. Then, I aimed for the next one, shot and killed it. Quick as a flash.

Approaching the walkers, I aimed another arrow but had slowly lowered it when I saw someone had pulled Enid back a little to protect her. "Kat?" a voice I didn't think I'd hear again called to me.

Trying to steady my breathing, my heart was beating rapidly as I felt my eyes widen in response to seeing someone I didn't think I'd ever see again. "Glenn?" I was stunned. Was this real? Stepping closer to him, I pulled him into a hug and felt relieved that he had survived. He was real. He really is alive.

As he held me tightly back, he seemed just as relieved as I was to see that we both survived the herd. "How? I-" I didn't know what to say to him. There were so many questions that raced around my head.

Pulling back, we smiled at one another. A friend, I thought I had lost a friend. Someone I saw as family, like another brother, was still alive. "Talk later, we need to move now," Enid stopped us from discussing anything further.

Letting each other go, Glenn took a step to the side and had glanced at Enid. "Lead the way," he gestured her to go first. "You know how to get back home...we don't," I could only hope that she'd listen to Glenn and do the right thing by taking us back to our loved ones.

Watching the young girl lead us down the alley, myself and Glenn glanced to one another, sad but relieved smiles graced our features. We were safe and now, we could go home. I might not have done my job but we were still successful when it came to surviving the herd.

Walking side by side, we followed Enid closely, neither of us letting her out of our sight while we kept moving forward. We were keeping our eyes peeled for any walkers, any threats and did our best not to get spotted by said threats.


DPOV

Once finally catching my breath, I got up and tilted the bike with all the strength I had, panting from the pain in both my leg and my arm. Forcing it back to stand up, I rolled it as best as I could deeper into the woods. Trying to get back on my bike, I fell off and let it fall down with me. "Sasha? Abraham, are you there?" I tried to see if they would respond once I took out my walkie talkie.

I heard nothing, only my own panting, I had looked to the ground. Passing bodies, corpses and burned walkers, it was like there had been a fire. The whole of the woods was dry, dead and the bodies were burned black. When I looked to the skull underneath me, I noticed blood was dripping down on the skull from my hand. Removing my clove, I shook the blood from my hands and did my best to remove my jacket after.

Examining my burn, the scrape was almost unbearable. Taking my backpack from the bike and my crossbow, I then hid my bike and kept an eye open for any of those attackers or walkers. Slow was my approach, until I heard a snap from the distance. Someone was out there.

Turning the corner, behind a tree, two women jumped up from their crouched positions and raised their hands up in surrender. "You found us, okay? Here we are," one of the girls had said, the one with the brown hair. "We earned what we took," she said, which only confused me as to what she was talking about.

Hearing a branch snap, I spun around quickly but I wasn't quick enough. A guy with what looked like a thick, broken branch from a tree had hit me across the face with it like a bat. Seeing black, the last thing I felt, was my body falling into the darkness.


KPOV

Finally getting out of the city, we had come across a few walkers along the way, something we all handled together, as a team. The road back home though, felt long and a little miserable. Coming across a walker that was on the floor, laid there, not crawling, only snarling and reaching for us but going nowhere.

To us, it wasn't a threat. To Enid, she had a different opinion to ours. Killing it, I had looked on and could understand that one less, meant a lesser chance anyone could get harmed. While Glenn looked down at her a little saddened she killed it when it wasn't entirely necessary. "What? Think your wife wouldn't have wanted me to kill it?" Enid questioned why he was looking at her in a bitter tone.

Already, we could tell she didn't like this journey she was on with us. She would of much prefer to run off when she had the chance. Unluckily for Enid, she had no choice. She was coming back with us, regardless what she wanted. How Glenn looked at Enid, it was like he wasn't impressed by her mentioning Maggie.

The simplest reason behind this, was because Enid didn't know if Maggie survived. All she knew, was that Carl and Judith had. Everyone else, she didn't really focus on. Walking ahead of us, Glenn had stayed still on the spot while Enid approached the green balloons we had used to keep track of our meeting points.

Taking hold of the string, Enid had cut the balloons loose and held onto the string as she glanced over to us. Glenn had stopped beside me, staying between myself and Enid as he was curious as to why she had taken the balloons. "We can use them to distract them," she had given us the reason in her taking the balloons.

After a few seconds of silence, it was like a sudden idea came to his mind. "There's a helium tank in those shrubs. More balloons, more string," this was what he'd suggested. This had been his idea.

Realising what his plan was, it hit me like a fresh slap on my face. "Will that be our sign?" I asked him, remembering the promise he made to Michonne for when we had gone our separate ways.

Glenn's eyes met mine while Enid slowly approached the shrubs not far from the balloons. "Yeah," he gave me a tight lipped smile while he began nodding slowly.

He was weary, sad and it made me think to Maggie. He must have thought she was dead or maybe he was still upset over Nicholas. Either way, I had placed my hand on his shoulder gently, giving it a light squeeze. "Hey, she's alive. I can feel it," I assured him with a small smile.

Something in me knew she was fine. She had to be. We had survived plenty of crazy people that burst through our gates and killed those that we cared about. Nodding to me, I could tell Glenn was trying to keep hopeful but there was a sadness in his eyes. Brushing past him lightly, I followed Enid into the shrubs as she crouched down and began looking for what Glenn had informed her hid in the shrubs

"I'll help you," I offered to help Enid with the task she had taken upon herself.

She didn't have to do it but it was better than having her run off on us again. "I don't need your help," she barked back drily. She was resenting me, when I hadn't done anything to upset her. In fact, she was the one who left me, taken some of my gathered supplies and almost had me killed.

Lowering my head, I stopped where I was headed and stared at the floor. Hands on my hips, I only had wanted to help her but she continued to push me away. "She'll come around," Glenn said after I felt him walk closer to my side once more.

"I hope," were the only words that could leave me. We only want to take her back, to somewhere she could be safe. It wasn't perfect but it was better than nothing.


DPOV

Gradually coming back to my senses, I heard faint echoing, like my head was underwater with how my mind was trying to return to a conscious state. "Probably just another soldier from one of the outposts. Probably hates him, too," I could hear the guy mumble, while he was scratching at something with his knife.

My eyes would shut, as I was slowly gaining consciousness. It was a gradual process after being hit in the head with whatever he'd been using. "You know how to use one?" a female voice had echoed in my ears as my eyes found the brunette shoving my crossbow into their bag.

"Yeah," the man said, from what I could tell. "Never liked using them to hunt," he mumbled but it still echoed in my head. My eyes would close shut with the recovery my brain tried to figure out as I regained myself slowly. "We pick up Patty and we're gone, okay? This is the last day we gotta live like this," they were all gathered around the fire, the guy was still scratching at something with his knife.

My eyes closed shut, this time, it took over until finally, I woke up to the sounds of crickets chirping. My hands tied up with rope, the blood that was on them earlier had tried and when I noticed feet in front of me, I looked up. "Get up," the guy ordered as he was crouched down to my level.

"Hey, get up," he ordered as he tapped me but I wasn't going to move. This asshole thinks I'm the enemy. I haven't done shit and I know nothing about them. Raising the gun, I heard it click and saw the barrel of the gun pointed to my right eye. "We're moving. Here's the deal. You don't say shit and I don't kill you," he was stern in his words but I could hear the tremble in his tone.

"I ain't who you think," I told him bluntly.

The sound of the hammer clicking, signalling that the safety was no longer on, didn't make me quake. It made me worry but I didn't fear death. "Say something else. Go ahead," he dared me. "Follow them," he ordered once he dragged me from my ropes, up onto my feet.

Walking for only a few minutes through the burned woods, I had followed behind the girls, the guy holding a gun to my back as he followed me. "Here, drink the rest," the brunette said to the blonde.

"We should save it," the blonde argued.

Refusing the water, made me wonder how long these guys had been out here. Made me wonder who they were hiding from. "We'll find some more. Drink," the brunette told the blonde. "You're supposed to stay hydrated," was the excuse brunette gave blonde. "It all works together."

"Yeah, it does," the blonde responded, making me confused as to what it was supposed to mean.

The girl had taken a sip of the water and handed it back to the brunette. Every time I slowed my pace, the man shoved me forward, to catch up with the others. Seeing the bodies, it was like a fiery graveyard here. What the hell happened here? "Have it," the brunette had slowed and offered me the bottle next.

Not saying a word, I didn't want to take anything that was there's. I wanted my stuff back and I wanted to get back to my friends. "We don't need you falling down. Drink," the man took the water and offered it to me. No one was moving until I drank.

Taking the bottle, I swallowed what was left and heard what the man was saying. "They find us, maybe we give you to them, they let us call it even," he continued talking like I knew what he was talking about.

"You see, we're reasonable people. Everybody's got their code. You feel you gotta kneel, that's fair enough. We don't," confusion only grew the more he spoke to me about another group, which was the only logical explanation to me. "Let's go," he ordered as he snatched the bottle from my hands and passed it back to the brunette.

Dragging me by the neck of my shirt, he forced me forward and made me speed up to keep up with the others. I have no idea who these people are. Or who they think I am with, but I am going to get the hell out of here the first chance I get.


KPOV

Having tied the balloons she had taken to a tree, she put her things down to get to work on the balloons Glenn mentioned. Crouching down with her, Glenn kept a few feet away from her, watching her while I kept watch of walkers around us. "Who did you stay with back home?" Glenn asked Enid, while she began filling helium into one of the balloons.

Turning her head as quick as a whip, her eyes went to Glenn. "It's not my home," Enid had answered him quickly. "I lived in Olivia's place. But I was on my own. Orphaned by walkers," she gave him a few answers while helium hissed into the balloon.

"Me, too. Probably," Glenn was relating himself to the girl.

Enid was slowly getting used to us, accepting the fact she was now stuck with us for a while. "It's just what happens," Enid tried to give an excuse as to why they were no longer with their parents. Glenn didn't know for definite but Enid sounded sure of herself.

Poor girl. She must have seen it happen. I began to wonder how long she had been out there for. I was curious to know of her story. Of all of it. "I get that you're scared," Glenn was the one sympathising with her as she turned her focus on the balloon.

"I'm not scared," the girl denied any assumption made of her.

Her voice though, wasn't as confident as she may of wanted it to be. It had been defensive and her head that whipped to look at him, slowly looked away. "Yeah, you are," he was certain of this. Something told me, he was right. "You don't want to lose anything again, so you give up and you say, 'That's just what happens,'" he quoted her, giving her a small lecture.

Enid wasn't interested in whatever Glenn had to say. I could sense it in the air that surrounded us. "I don't need a lecture," she told him, wanting to stop him from analysing her any further. We don't know her but we both have been her.

Glenn wasn't giving up and this was the first time I had seen him so passionately talking to a kid that wasn't my brother. "Yeah, I think you do," he wasn't going to end it there. "You honour the dead by going on. Even when you're scared. You live because they don't get to," his words were inspirational.

"You think your parents wanted you waving around a gun because you're afraid?" was the question he gave her that had really hit a nerve for her.

Quickly, she had spun around and raised her voice at him. "We don't have to talk," she was angry as she said it the first time. Gradually, her head turned back to the balloons. "We don't have to talk," this time, it was noticeably sadder than the first time she'd said it.

When it got quiet, I took a few steps closer to them, I didn't enjoy seeing Glenn so upset, or weakened by a girl. "How are the balloons coming along?" I asked Enid, hoping to change the subject. "Need a hand?" I offered to help her.

What Glenn had said, had really left Enid a little broken and unsettled. "I got it," she was firm but realised who she had been talking to. Realised that I was her friend, Carl's, eldest sister. "Can I just-can I have some space?" she pleaded of me, of both of us.

"Drop it, Kat," Glenn's voice softly advised me as he got to his feet beside me, standing up straight as we both kept watch for walkers and for Enid. Neither of us wanted her slipping away, again.


DPOV

Following behind, I was getting tired of following these people around. I needed to get back, to find Sasha and Abraham. I needed to get back to Kat, to the others. These people were holding me back. "I can't believe we're back," the blonde had said.

"It's not home anymore, but it's better than where we were," the brunette spoke with a confidence that was a little unnerving.

All I could wonder was just who they were running from. How sick must these people be for a small group like this to run away from it? "This is a pit stop. We pick up Patty, nothing more than that," the guy had informed the others that the stay wherever we were going was going to be very brief.

I need to get away from them as quickly as possible. I don't plan to stick with them for another night. "How'd you do it?" the blonde asked them as she looked to the floor, watching where she stepped.

As the girls lead the way, I was listening in to their conversation. "You saw where we left the truck?" the blonde had hummed a response to the guy. "We opened the valve and drove all the way in from Farmview Road. Ran from the tree line till we got to the pavement. Lit up a matchbook from the Sweetwater and dropped it in on the trail," he was telling her how he was the one to set the whole place on fire.

Walking past the bodies, I then realised it wasn't people. It was walkers. Hearing one still a little alive but too weak and melted to move, he growled and reached up to us from the floor. "Then we just ran for the car. Got in and the dead ones were there. They were beating on the hood, and then-and then boom! Knocked 'em on their asses and I took an axe to each one," the man finished his story on how these walkers perished.

These people had been fighting. "Then we just watched it go up. No more moans, no more of that wailing. It was just the fire, just burning them all away," the brunette said.

Looking around, I was amazed that these people found a way to take out all these walkers, just using fire. "You did all this?" I asked them while I examined the area. All that was left of the walkers, were bones and ashes.

The guy began catching up with me. "It was right at the start. Everything stopped-the TV, the radio. We were here. The forest was full of them," the brunette began explaining to me how this came to be. "And the other ones in town, they were drawn to it. They just walked right into the flames. We got most of them," she gave me all the details of what it was like during this fire.

The fire was so big, so bright, it got the walkers straight into it. If it didn't damage the wildlife and the trees, I would say this was a pretty smart plan. "Thought we ended it for us, and she was in DC," the brunette pointed to the blonde. "We thought everyone was fighting them wherever they were."

"Yeah, we thought that was what everybody was doing. Fighting it. That we'd all win together," this was the kind of hope that only Kat would sympathise with. We all thought that someone would come save the day but no one did. "We were stupid," the guy said.

He had slowly let me go and walked ahead. Stopping in my tracks, I wondered if I should just run but he had a gun and I couldn't risk it yet, not when she still had my bow. "Y'all don't think you're being stupid right now?" I challenged him.

Suddenly, his hammer clicked again as he stopped in front of me and aimed the gun at my head. "Are you saying I should kill you? I mean it, are you gonna try and pull something on us?" he questioned me, challenging me back as he stopped right in front of me.

"Are we just being thick here by not removing all doubt?" he admitted that maybe, I wasn't part of the group he thought I was with. "Right now, by me not pulling this trigger, is that a mistake?" he asked me.

This was the kind of question I didn't know how to answer straight away. I had done many shitty things in the past but did I deserve to die? Maybe. I had let so many people I cared about die in the past. Sometimes, I wondered if I deserved to live, to have Kat in my life the way she was now. I had my own doubts but I wasn't going to stop fighting now.

"I'm serious," he pulled me back to reality as my eyes rose to meet with his. "I really wanna know. You made a choice to kill for someone else, to have them own you for a roof over your head and three squares, so maybe I'm not considering all aspects here," he was a little angered with the group he was talking about. "You tell me, am I being stupid?" he asked me.

Funny enough, I had killed people in the past too, to protect my friends, the people I considered family. I had done things just to get back to the four walls and a roof over my head. I had killed for someone else, to protect them and truthfully, I would of done whatever I had to, in order to save the ones I had lost.

Looking him directly in the eyes, I couldn't fault him for unknowingly having me tied the way I was. For threatening to kill me after everything. I was still a threat but only because I knew how to be. "No," I answered him honestly. "Look, I got somewhere to be. We can make a deal. I can help you out," I was doing whatever I could to get them to let me loose, so I could find Sasha and Abraham.

All I wanted, was to find them and go home. "You're one of them. You're hurt and you're alone and you'd say anything," is what the guy assumed as I tried to step away from him. "We should've never trusted you people to begin with," he said like he knew me. "Go on," he had gestured with the gun for me to keep moving. "Keep moving," he ordered.

Listening to him, I walked ahead of him and would glance at him as I passed him. I don't want to be seen as a threat by them. I know they're afraid but I have more important things to deal with right now. I have to go home, I have to find Abraham and Sasha. But I knew that now, was not the time.


KPOV

Our pace back home was slow, as I had glanced to Glenn, we had been walking in silence, neither of us had asked how the other had somehow survived. "Glenn," I called to him as he slowed to walk beside me. "What happened back there? Last I saw, Nicholas blew his brains out and took you down with him," I gave him the small insight on what I saw go down. "I really thought you were dead."

"They didn't get me..." Glenn stated the facts. "They tried but they didn't. They were eating Nicholas's corpse when he collapsed on-top of me," he explained that the one getting devoured had been Nicholas and not himself.

Just the thought was a horrific one to picture. Poor Glenn. "I crawled under the dumpster, killed a few of them and just hid under there all night," he began informing me of how he survived the night. "Enid found me, tossed me water and I eventually found David...he didn't make it back," Glenn seemed sad to tell me what he'd found while in search of our friends.

"Michonne..." her name got caught in my throat.

She has to be alive. She's the toughest woman I know. I had to know if Glenn had any sign of her. "There was no sign of her there," Glenn told me there were two outcomes from this. Michonne was dead somewhere, or maybe she got back with some of the others.

Shutting my eyes momentarily as my feet lead me in the direction my heart wanted to take me. Home. Back to dad, to Carl, to Judith, to Daryl. Back to Michonne. "She's got to be back home then. She must be," I had to be confident in this because its just who was I was.

It was what I knew. Michonne is strong, smart and she's capable of surviving more than I can. "What did you do?" Glenn had changed the subject after a few moments of silence. He was just as curious as to how I had survived after he last saw me up on the roof.

More than likely, he must of wondered how I got down and survived the herd that surrounded us everywhere. It wasn't easy, I'll give him that. "At first, I was just surviving, climbing in, out and on-top of buildings. Used walker guts to hide from the herd as I would walk the streets," I gave him my strategy and how I survived that way.

The real challenge wasn't even surviving past the herd, it was finding Enid while avoiding it. "I spotted Enid in one of the buildings and she ran away from me. I tried to get to her, eventually I did. Spent the night with her," I told him how I had bumped into the slippery kid. "When I woke up the next morning, she was gone and had taken a few of my supplies that I had scavenged."

A little hurt that she'd ditched me and left me vulnerable, I guess I should have known better than to trust she wouldn't do something like that. "She's a slippery one," Glenn agreed with me. "She kept running away from me too," he told me that not only I was the one who had been chasing her down, Glenn had too.

So he had been the stalker all along towards the end. Somehow, us talking about her only irritated her slightly. "Can you guys stop talking about me?" she asked of us, irritation clear in her tone of voice towards us. "I can hear you guys, you know that, right?" she asked us, like an annoyed kid listening to their parents discussing their child in the same room as them with other guests.

Fighting a grin to myself, I knew that little Enid was only annoyed we were gossiping about her but she was also annoyed we took her options, her choices, out of the picture for her forcefully. She'd do her best to convince us otherwise but we weren't going to let her out there, to die alone and to lose the best chance at a home. "Fine, we'll stop. Sorry," I apologised on our behalf.

Glenn and I had exchanged looks, that of a small, sad smile. Silence fell and the steps we took, suddenly felt heavy. "Nicholas had little water left and the flare gun broke after I dropped it," Glenn changed the subject, like Enid wanted us to. "So...are you and Daryl a thing now?" he asked me after a few more minutes had gone by.

Mention of Daryl had me stunned to hear his name, even if he was someone I had thought about almost constantly. If it wasn't him on my mind, it was my brother, my father, Michonne, Judith and others I cared about. Although, those five were the main that kept my mind always on the go.

Having Glenn mention Daryl though, brought that cycle back onto the one who was out there, leading the herd and possibly back at Alexandria, waiting for me or dead from the amount of walkers that were heading their way. I didn't know of anything. All I could do, was hope that whatever happened, that this was a lesson for both of us.

Anything could go wrong, at any given moment and I didn't want to doubt my emotions, my stance with him. When people asked, I wanted to be certain that me and him, we were solid, we were real. "After all of this...I'd hope so," I smiled, trying to stay hopeful as I looked ahead. Home isn't far now.

The way Glenn had looked to me, was like he was peaceful, content to hear that I was thinking of making myself and Daryl more official than I anticipated. "Good, life's too short," he encouraged me to take chances, to do everything before it was too late.

He has a point. Today, we can die just as easily if we aren't careful than before. The quarry, it was proof of it and I wasn't going to waste time anymore time anymore. He's right. Life is too short.


DPOV

Making me walk ahead towards the end of our journey, the guy had shoved me forward, shoved me into a small clearing by a fence. Gazing out to the area, I saw there were trucks filled with gas and walkers surrounding them. "Son of a bitch," the guy was shocked to see the walkers surrounding the area. "Patty," he said once he stopped by the fence.

The group had walked ahead, dumping the bag on the ground and left me alone at the back. For holding me hostage, they don't know how to not trust someone. Getting emotional and not alert, can get them killed. "She could be..." the woman said sadly before the guy with her ran his fingers through his hair with frustration.

All of them had their backs to me, no one looked back to see if I was still there or if I had taken the bag from them. "No, she's gone," the guy was sure about this 'patty' person.

Taking a few steps closer to the bag, I was getting ready to take it and run. What I wanted, what I needed, was my crossbow. "Then we make another plan," the brunette was nodding her head.

Stopping in my tracks, I saw the guy turn around and look at her, capable of seeing me sneaking up behind her. "Yeah, we get out of here, that's the plan," the man was trying to come up with something for them. It was basic but at least they weren't planning on killing me so far.

"Then that's the plan," the brunette agreed hurriedly.

"You guys didn't have to do this for me," the blonde insisted.

None of them were really paying attention to me as the brunette looked over to the blonde. "It was the right thing for all of us," the brunette was reassuring the blonde. Slowly...I can get that bag and run.

All I needed, was a little more time, with their backs to me and if possible, a distraction for them. "This was the right thing?" the blonde said sarcastically. "Even if just you guys went back now, if you just told them that it was me..."

"No, we'll find a way," the brunette wasn't planning on going back to the other group they must have come from.

Hearing them argue, I gradually took a few steps closer to the bag and would dart my eyes between the three of them. All their backs were still to me. "Just think about it," the blonde pleaded with them to leave her behind.

"No," the brunette spoke firmly.

Glancing between the girls and then the scene in front of them, the man pointed to the direction of the trucks. "Look, maybe we don't get as far, but we'll get-" he went to say but by miracle, the blonde had fainted. The brunette was calling the blonde girl by her name, by 'Tina'. The couple had reached for Tina, trying to support her, to wake her from her episode.

Snatching the bag, I ran and heard the man yell after me. "Hey, stop! No!" he shouted when he saw me leave with their bag. Booking it out of there, I ran and kept running back from where I came, back to my bike. Gunshots were being fired at me as I ran.

Hiding against a burned, broken branch, I began gnawing on the ropes, trying to set myself free. Using a rock, I scraped the rope against it and pried my hands free from my binds. Getting my walkie talkie, I tried to get into contact with Sasha and Abraham but heard nothing back. Keeping an eye open for the group, in case they chased after me, I tried to catch my breath.

Panting after the run to safety. The sound of a walker made me look over my shoulder. Getting on my hands and knees, I crawled over to the bag and unzipped the bag. Looking for my crossbow, I tugged on it, trying to get it out but it was a fight to get it.

The walker was fast approaching and I had to hurry. Please, be safe. I could hear Kat's voice echo in my ears. Just as I was struggling with it, it was almost out and the walker was quickly approaching. I need to get back to her. I have to get back to her. When I finally got my bow out, it luckily already had an arrow in place. Spinning to face it, I fell on my back and shot up at the walker. Watching the arrow fly and hit it in the eye, it collapsed and stayed down.

Panting, I checked to make sure it was really dead and relaxed. I'm alive. I'm alive. Now, I knew I could get back to Kat, I had what I needed and all I had to do now, was find Abraham and Sasha, that way we could go home. Sitting up, I moved to get on my knees and look at the bag I had taken. Inside the bag, was something that the bow got stuck to. It was a huge medicine kit, something that must have been for the girl that fainted.

Already, my conscience was eating away at me. I have to bring this back to them. If they need it, they should have it. It's not mine and I don't want anymore enemies today.


KPOV

Finally making it back to Alexandria, I was surprised to slow my pace and stare at our walls, surrounded by walkers. The herd had spread out, had followed someone back more than likely, who, had me instantly worried. "My God," Glenn had been the one to speak about the horror we were confronted with.

Hearing a rustle from beside me, a little behind us, I turned and saw Glenn turning at the same time I did. "Stop," he said as he spotted Enid retreating to go back the same road we just came from. "I said stop," he chased her and stopped in front of her.

Approaching them slowly, I went to run with him but when I saw him get there before I did, I relaxed and made a slower approach. "What's the point?" she asked him. "The world is trying to die. We're supposed to just let it," was her excuse of turning away, of wanting to leave and live out there.

She has to be kidding, right? I didn't want her to be so negative, she didn't have to be. She didn't need to be. "No. You're wrong. We're not supposed to let the world die. And I sure as hell am not gonna let you die," he wasn't going to agree with her.

How strongly he felt, was exactly how I did too. "I'm sure your wife will forgive you," Enid was already giving him permission to let her go. That her life, it didn't matter as much as Glenn might of thought.

Enid was still wrong. She was worth everything and the fact she didn't see it, meant we had to fight to keep her alive more than we did before. "It's not for her anymore," he told her. This was for her, for himself. She meant something to us. "Look, the walls are still up. The houses are still up. We'll find out the rest. Okay?" he offered her a new plan.

All while, I had slowly turned my back on them, gazing out to the walls, hoping to see someone keeping watch, seeing no one, it then reminded me of the points where people could keep watch. We needed to find out, see if someone was on patrol.

"Let's go find a watch point...someone's got to be there," I gave them a plan as I guided them through the woods that surrounded us. Keeping away from the roads, as to not get spotted by the herd before getting spotted by our loved ones in Alexandria.


DPOV

Walking through the woods again, going in the direction of where the group were, I eventually found them sat down on one of the logs, possibly trying to come up with a new plan. Crossbow up, I didn't trust them as I got closer to them, the bag draped over me. "Drop the gun. Drop it," I ordered for the guy as he aimed it up at me. "Give it to me," I commanded of him.

Slowly he approached me and handed me the gun. "I came all this way. What you got for the duffel? You put me through too much shit just to give it back," I questioned them. "Principle of the thing," I said, sounding more like Aaron and Kat every day. "What you got besides this gun?" I wondered if they had any other weapons in the bag too.

I didn't check for anything else, except that big box that weighed more than I thought it would. "Nothing," the brunette assured me that was the only weapon they had.

Not letting my guard down, I just wanted to get this over with, to go find Sasha and Abraham, to get back home to the others. "What was that thing you were carving?" I was continuing to bombard them with questions.

The same way they would bombard me, it was their turn to understand how it felt to be held captive like they had with me. To feel threatened by someone, who should have meant no threat at all. "My grandfather taught me how-" the guy said as he pulled out a wooden thing, something of value to him.

Something he valued, to be replaced by something they needed. "Don't care. It'll do," I didn't care for what story he wanted to pity me with. Handing me the figure, I took it and thought that maybe Carl or Judith might like it back home. "Take it. It's all there. Good luck. You're gonna need it," I said, dumping the bag and leaving the group behind.

Turning my back on them, I went to leave them, to go back to my bike and act like today never happened. Suddenly, a truck came through, breaking branches and other twigs as it rolled up to a stop in front of the group. These guys had mowed down trees like it was nothing.

Hiding behind a tree the second I heard these guys approaching, the door opening and closing once the people inside the truck stepped out. "Let's end this," one man had said but all I could see was his feet.

"It's ours. We earned what we took," the brunette declared to them as they were beginning to approach them.

The men looked clean, like they had been somewhere safe, like a community. It made me question if these were the guys that they were running from. When I saw the truck, I realised this was the same group that had been firing at myself, Sasha and Abraham. "You're gonna return what you took. You're gonna pay for the gas it took to come out here and for all the time these men took out. It's over. You know the rules," the man said his speech.

The fact this guy was hunting them down like animals, made me worry for them. I understood their fear now. "Your rules are batshit!" the brunette had yelled to the man, unsettled by his desire to take them back by force.

"We're not going back, Wade. We're done kneeling!" the guy yelled to him.

The man from the truck, Wade, was enjoying the show. "Don't change the subject, asshole," he then whistled, which called the truck over. Trees were snapping underneath it as the brakes squealed. The huge machine of a car was fighting against everything underneath it.

The small group was panicking. "Come on," the guy tried to lead them in the wrong direction.

Deciding to help them, I knew they needed it, if they were going to get away without getting captured, they needed to go somewhere that would be more difficult to follow. "Hey, that way. Come on. Go, go, go. Go," I ordered, jumping out from behind the tree and leading them through a lot of trees that stood tall, stood tall, which would force the men to go on foot.

Tina had tripped a little, possibly feeling weak with the medication she needed. "Get up," I ordered as I began following the man and the brunette as they crouched down and hid. A tree snapping in the distance, I helped Tina get to them and slowly let her go with the brunette. "Hey. Take it," I told the guy, offering him back his gun. Taking it from me, he aimed for anyone approaching.

The sound of a walkie static hissing was heard as I glanced around a tree to see what was going on. "Eyes open. You cover your quadrant. Go to alpha channel," Wade's voice was heard through the radio. Growling weakly behind a rock, a walker had got stuck there as it reached for anything to eat.

Tina had laid herself in the brunette's arms as the man had been pointing his gun in the direction of one of the guys that was with the opposing group. "Love you, Sher," the blonde whispered up to the brunette. "You didn't have to for me," she was feeling faint in her arms.

Seeing a guy approaching another direction, going towards past the rocks, I had a plan almost instantly. If he gets close enough to the rock, it will be one less guy. Rustling the branches in front of me, he had his gun ready and went towards us.

If everything went right...he would be walker dinner. Snarling was heard but by the time the guy noticed the walker, it had already grabbed him and chowed down on his arm. Screaming echoed through the woods as he slammed the butt of his gun against the walker, killing it as it bit at his arm.

"Wade, I'm bit! Wade, I'm bit!" he whimpered as he clutched at his arm. "Take it off me. Do it! Just take it off!" he yelled as he got to the ground, placing his arm on a rock. Wade followed soon after, wrapping his belt around the man's arm and taking out a knife.

"I'll get your watch after," Wade had said before he began slicing his arm off. It took a few swings for it to come clean off. The man was screaming, crying as his arm was detached from his body after the bite he took. "Alright, that's it. Time to go home. Cam got a boo-boo," Wade said into the walkie talkie.

Glancing to Sher and Tina, I had noticed Tina was getting more weak by the second and Sher began taking out medicine for her. "Are you sure?" one guy asked over the radio.

Wade glanced to Cam, who had been whimpering, clutching to his stump of an arm. "Oh, yeah. He only wanted to take this so far," Wade stated to the guy on the other line. "And he only wants ass that's willing, you know?" these words made me feel sick, Wade then proceeded to remove the watch from the detached arm and tossed it to one side. "Come on, Cam. Let's walk it off," Wade had helped Cam up off his feet.

Once the coast was clear, I relaxed and noticed that the guy was staring up at me. Sher finished injecting Tina with something and the man had looked at me, completely stunned and a little ashamed in himself, I guess. "We thought you were with them. We knock you over the head, tie you up, threaten to kill you..." he listed all the things that had happened between us since we met. "Why the hell did you come back?" he asked me a little breathless, possibly from the fear.

Grunting, I didn't know exactly why I had come back for them but there was one thing I knew for sure. Kat would be stupid enough to do something like this. Or at least, I had thought that maybe she would. Rick...not so much. "Maybe I'm stupid, too," was the only answer I could give them.


KPOV

Leaving the spot, we went to look around for a spot where we could have then get a clear view of the balloons, it would take a while and we needed to find weak points or parts of the wall that were open for us to sneak up to, so we could climb over. "You know, the fact you think living, surrounded by people who care, is pointless...makes it even more important for you to go back, for us to bring you back," I said as I walked beside Enid.

Glenn had glanced to me from over his shoulder slightly, I didn't want to hurt her but she needed to hear what I thought. It might not change anything but I could see she was slowly starting to listen to us. "Why?" Enid asked me. "So I can make Carl happy?" the way she said it, was a little mockingly towards me, to my statement that she made us want to fight harder for her to live.

"Partly, yes," I had noticed how Carl was a lot more hopeful, a lot more his age around her and he seemed happy with her. "But that's not the point of it," I changed the subject to what I was talking about earlier.

Carl wasn't the only reason. "Living out there, with no roof over your head, sometimes, with no guaranteed food in your belly, or enough water to keep you hydrated for a few hours...it's easy," I told her honestly, making Enid look at me a little curious to hear what I had to say. "It's something you get used too far too quickly. With the fear of dying keeping you alive, the chances you take on instinct."

All of this, was based off the experience I had on the road with Andrea, Michonne and later with the others. "Now going in there, living with people, trying to protect each other, caring about them. On if they live, if they die...it's a huge risk," I stated the facts.

Enid was silent, listening to each word I said. "We all die one day or another. It's the only thing that is inevitable. Always was and it hurts way too much," I remembered the amount of pain I carried around me every day of those I had lost. "But this life, caring for other people, having to watch them die, it's not only a curse..."

Trailing off, she slowed her footing and kept her eyes glued to the floor. "It's a blessing," I stated the strange balance life and death had. "It gives you purpose. Gives you a reason to fight," I explained what those lives meant, or at least, for me. "For the roof over your head, for the bed that keeps you warm while you sleep, the food in your stomach. All of it," I listed to her.

"It's ours to protect, the people, its a reason to keep living," I took a step to her side a little, as she stopped in her tracks and focused on the ground.

Enid seemed a little more than ticked off. "You don't have to give me a lecture either," she spoke a little sternly, irritated with both me and Glenn giving her all the lectures we were telling her.

Glenn had stopped to look over at us, he was the one leading the way to our home. "Maybe not but I will," I was going to accept her request but I had more to say. As much as she didn't like the lecture, I had been biting my tongue for far too long.

"There was a time, when I was out there...before Judith was born. All I had, was Michonne and a woman called Andrea," I informed Enid of the small anecdote I always told those who wanted to listen. "My family and myself, we got separated because of a herd. They thought I had died," I continued telling her the story everyone else knew.

"She's telling the truth. For almost a whole year, we thought Kat was dead," Glenn agreed with me, remembering the time spent with my parents and brother better than I did.

Nodding, I respected him more, simply because he'd been there for my family when they were probably at a low point with just me being 'dead' to them. "Me, I could have thought they died but I didn't. I tried to keep them as alive as I possibly could. I couldn't accept it. Crazy thinking, right?" I asked her after telling her what kind of mental attitude I had towards it all.

Enid's little laugh was soft. "Yeah," she was sarcastic about it.

It was like she was pretending like she didn't care for it. "Well, it was one of the only things that kept me going. That...and Michonne, and Andrea," I remembered that time like it was yesterday. Not only did my family keep me together, it was those around me. "People I cared about that I did everything I could to keep them safe."

People, having them, it was the thing that kept even the most insane people safe, sane. People like Michonne, who took her time to open up to us. "We don't choose to care for people, it happens," I explained what it was like.

My own experience proved this to be true. I couldn't help but care and worry for Michonne, for Andrea. For me to want to protect them. "Caring for people, living to see them another day, to maybe reunite with them again, like I plan to with whoever survived the attack yesterday..." I pointed to Alexandria.

Taking a whole minute to let it sink in, Glenn looked at me with softened eyes, like he too had high hopes to find people to keep fighting for. "That is a blessing, because you never know just how much longer you have left and every life, it matters these days," I trailed off. "Fighting for others, its all we got," I finished and lead the way.

I felt Glenn and Enid glance to each other silently before they followed on behind me. All I wanted, was to get back home, back to Judith, dad, Carl, Michonne and Daryl. Back to the people that mattered most to me. Maggie, Carol, the others, all of them were family too but those five had a special place in my heart. I'm coming home...


DPOV

No longer a threat to one another, the group needed to go to another spot before we could go look for my bike. I hadn't told them yet where we could go but I was going to help them get to where they needed to be. "So you knew 'em? Still you thought I was one of them?" I asked them after a while of us just walking in silence.

"Where we were-we were there since the beginning," Dwight had finally told me his name in brief exchange. Now that his guard was no longer up around me. "We still didn't know everyone. Back when we first threw in with them, it was as good as a place as any. Then things got harder, people got harder. Human nature kicked in and it became a truly unique kind of shitshow," he explained what happened to the place he was in.

"People will trade anything for safety, for knowing that they're safe," Sherry had told me.

To think that these people did unspeakable things just to have a roof over their heads, it was something I could understand why they wanted to run away from that place. "Everything. So they got nothing left except just...existing," the way Dwight made it sound, it sounded like a nightmare of a place.

Although, I knew that no matter where we were, there was always a probability of losing people. No matter how careful we were, or how smart we tried to be, it was inevitable we'd lose people we least expected. "Hey, nobody's safe anymore. Can't promise people that anyhow," I argued.

Walking together like equals, it felt a little more peaceful between us, regardless the awful start we had. "You could promise the people who want to hear it," Dwight argued back lightly. "Hey, Tina, hold up," he called after the girl who just began running to something she saw after she stopped.

Following after her, it looked like a greenhouse, one that got demolished during the fire and left to rot the way it was. "Carla and Delly," Tina spoke sadly, seeing a couple of corpses wrapped in melted glass. "That's them," Tina was sure that those inside the greenhouse that perished, were from the old community they must have lived in.

Looking at them confused, I wondered what happened here, who these people were. "Me and Tina used to babysit them when they were kids. Everyone said that they went out north when it all started," Sherry explained as Tina went to see the bodies. "We didn't know."

Placing the bag to one side before she took some flowers, Tina went to place some flowers on the two that had died. "I did this," Dwight looked to be hurt by the scene in front of him.

"We did this," Sherry shared the blame with him. Just as Tina put the flowers down, the next thing happened far too quickly to process. The two that had died had come back, breaking out of the shards and startling Tina, causing her to trip and get devoured by them at either sides of her neck.

As she was getting eaten, I ran to save her, grabbing each walker by a time to drive my knife into each skull. Once they were dead, Tina slowly died in Sherry's sobbing arms. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry, baby. We had to try. We had to try. We had to. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry. I'm..." she sobbed and held her close.

When Sherry finally moved away from the body, I ended it before she could return as a walker. Taking a shovel each, me and Dwight began digging a hole between us for Tina. So far, they were scared people but they appeared to be good people with the right kind of morals.

Staring at Dwight, I wanted to help them find a place, somewhere they could feel safe. Somewhere that they didn't need to feel like that had to leave because they disagreed with their way of life. "Hey. How many walkers you killed? Just answer the question," I asked Dwight the first question.

"A lot. A couple dozen at least," he answered me as he stopped digging, panting from the work that was being put into digging.

Looking him in the eyes, I needed to make sure he wasn't lying to me. "How many people you killed?" I gave him the second question.

This was the right way. The right way to recruit people into our community. The same way we had done it back at the prison. "None," he was quick to respond to my question.

"Why?" was the last one I had to ask him, to make sure I could decide if he could be brought back with us or not.

These questions mattered to us enough, that it was a way of making sure we know what these people were capable of. "Why haven't I killed anybody?" Dwight seemed a little sceptical of my question. "Because if I did, there'd be no going back. There'd be no going back to how things were."

That answer was a good enough question. One that reminded me of Glenn, of his way of thinking. "I'm from a place where people are still like they were...more or less, better or worse," I tried to give them insight of where I was from.

Both of them listened to me, accepting my offer to come with me. That there was a place for them back in Alexandria. Continuing the graves, we buried all three of those that they had lost and made it back to my bike. "I can walk it from here. Till we meet up with my friends," I grunted as I began unveiling my bike. "They got a car. You can ride with them."

"How many friends you say there were?" Dwight had asked me.

Catching him, I had kept note that I didn't tell him that I had friends out there. All I did say, was that I had somewhere I needed to be. "I didn't," I corrected him after he tried to dupe me. "There's two of 'em," I answered his question regardless.

"Where are they?" he bombarded me with questions I couldn't answer.

While dragging it to stand, I began pushing my bike and tried to get it to steady and rise up more. "We're gonna find out," I grumbled between pants.

I could hear footsteps behind me but they had slowed and eventually stopped abruptly. "How do you know they even got away? That they didn't get taken?" Dwight appeared to be very sceptical about everything.

Somehow, I felt like he didn't trust me but I was going to convince them otherwise. "I don't," I was being honest with them. Suddenly, the sound of a hammer clicking, alerted me that the gun was back, aimed at me and off its safety. "Oh, damn it."

Today, really wasn't my day. Dropping the bike, I spun to face them and tugged on my crossbow, trying to lift it off me in time but it had been too late. He already had me at gun point. "I'm sorry," he apologised. "Give her the crossbow," Dwight proceeded to order from me.

"You gonna go back? You gonna be safe?" I spat the questions at them, knowing that if that was their plan, to go back to those people, then they were just as psychotic as they were.

This had hit Dwight's nerve. "Shut up," he snarled at me.

If they thought that place was good enough for them, they were clearly making a mistake. "Ain't nowhere safe no more," I was doing my best to convince them not to do this.

Dwight wasn't having it, no matter what I said or did, it wasn't going to cut it with him. "Give her the crossbow," he tried again.

I wasn't going to give up, not yet. He knew I was no threat. He said he wasn't going to kill anyone, so why would he kill me? "You gonna kneel?" I was trying to call his bluff. Shooting to the tree behind me, I knew he was being serious now. Taking my crossbow off my back, I handed it to Sherry and watched as they got up on the bike and he started the engine.

It was Sherry now pointing the gun at me. Taking something, she tossed me a few things, it fell on the ground and I didn't care to pick it up. "Patch yourself up," she said, like she was helping me. "We're sorry," she apologised for their actions.

Already, I knew that I should have killed them, or scared them. Or maybe that I should of never helped them. I should have left. "You're gonna be," I warned them. If I cross their paths ever again, I won't think twice about killing them for fucking me over this way.

As they sped off, I picked up what Sherry tossed to me and inspected the heavy wooden figure that Dwight gave me. Feeling like an idiot, I hated myself for getting played this way. How he fucked me over. How they both had fucked me over.

Never again. I had thought to myself. Maybe some people were worth saving but then Rick's words came to mind again. Well, people out there, they got to take care of themselves, just like us. Which was exactly what they had done. Maybe Rick was right.


KPOV

Finding a good spot to let go of the balloons, we needed to hope it wouldn't get caught between the trees, or not get spotted by anyone keeping watch. Hopefully, they flew high enough to show the others we were alive. "Ready?" Glenn asked after he untied the balloons off Enid's backpack.

She had been standing really still. "Yeah," she assured him she was ready.

When he undid them, he handed the handful of balloons to the girl and glanced up to the balloons. Hopefully they are big enough to notice. "Let go," he ordered and this was when she unclasped her hand. All three of us stopped to watch the balloons float up to the sky.

The balloons floated up, up and up. Praying they didn't get caught, or pop too soon, we waited and saw it rise way higher than I imagined. "Let's hope they see it..." I whispered. "That this way, they know we're alive," I said as I glanced beside me.

Looking past Enid, Glenn looked me directly in the eyes and offered a sad, small smile. "I hope so too," he agreed with me. It seemed like all this journey taught us, was hope was still alive, as long as we had each other.

Smiling back at him, a gasp made us look to where Enid had been watching. Her mouth hung wide open as we watched the tower lean over, more and more. Until it collapsed and took down a huge chunk of the wall with it. Inviting all the walkers into Alexandria. We heard screams, yelling and a huge crash as it fell.

"Oh no..." I felt my heart stop for a second. Carl. Judith. Dad. Michonne. Daryl...all of them were there and walkers had now been granted false permission to walk our streets.


DPOV

Finding my way back to the walker that wore the helmet, I had noticed there had been some kind of sign beside him. Sweeping at it, I had found out that it was connected to a fuel truck company. Walking around for a while more, I came across a path of what appeared to be truck that had swerved a little.

Pushing the branches away, I eventually found one of the fuel trucks I could only imagine was still usable. Checking it, I had seen there was enough to take back with us. And that there was only one walker sat at the front seat. Opening the door, he had his seat belt on and appeared to be starved, like he hadn't eaten anything for years.

Using the only weapon I had, my knife, I stabbed it and almost fell after taking my knife out of its skull. Checking to see if it still worked once I pulled the body out, I began to track Sasha and Abraham down. I had found footprints and eventually my name on a door. When I saw their heads pop around a window, I climbed out and had made sure they could see me properly.

Once they joined me, I had poked a little fun at Abraham's clothes but he was proud about it. Truthfully, the both of them seemed happy. On the drive back, we talked about what happened to us after we got separated. Every so often, I would try contacting Rick through the walkie talkie.

"Rick, you copy?" I spoke into the walkie talkie. The static hissed at me. "Anybody?" I was hoping for anything but the static kept hissing. A garbled voice over radio was heard but I couldn't understand what was said. "Say it again?" I squinted, trying to hear it better.

Sasha and Abraham were just as surprised as I was to hear a response after getting nothing from it for a long time. "Help," a small whimper of a voice pleaded for someone to rescue them.

Looking to Abraham and Sasha, I began to floor it, needing to get back home as quickly as we could. They were still in trouble and I was going to do my best to save them. Hold on Kat, I'm coming.


A/N: Hope you enjoyed chapter 4 out of 7 in this wave of chapters. So far, I have been enjoying writing these chapters and it's only going to get more crazy intense. Next chapter is going to be a little less action filled but...you'll be reading that shortly. Hope you enjoyed this, leave a review, those help me see what you're liking and what you aren't.

Questions for this chapter to be answered:

1) What did you think of this chapter?

2) How do you feel about Kat and Daryl's journey separately in this chapter?

3) Do you want more scenes between KatXEnid or KatXMaggie or KatXGlenn?

4) How do you feel Kat would react if Carl, Rick and Michonne all died in the next few seasons to come?

5) How would you want her to react to those deaths?

Much love,

HeroJustInTime90