Helloooooo!
Sorry for the long wait, but school happened.
So this chapter gives more of a look into Blake's past, hopefully its enjoyable. In case it's unclear, the italicised bit is a flashback.
As always, I own nothing to do with TWD.
Enjoy!
Blake woke to someone gently shaking her shoulder. She rolled over and opened her eyes, seeing Michonne standing next to her bed. "I though Rick wanted second watch?" Blake yawned and stretched, sitting up and removing the comforter.
"You and I both know that if he takes second, there won't be a third. Especially considering Carl." Michonne explained.
"Yeah, good point." Blake grabbed her Machine gun, sluing it over her shoulder and strapped her machete holster to her thigh. "Should I wake him later?" she asked as she left. "He'll be mad if I don't, but he needs it."
"You decide." Michonne shrugged. "If you need more sleep, wake him, if not, don't. Without us here, he isn't going to be resting much tomorrow."
"Okay." Blake left the room and quietly made her way down the hall and down the stairs to the living room. When she got there, Blake sat on the floor, leaning against the couch near Carl's head.
Michonne had left the quilt on the coffee table, and Blake moved to put it around her shoulders but paused; she turned onto her knees, and draped it over Carl. It was cold in the house, especially since the room was in the back of the house and had two outer walls.
Blake went back to leaning against the couch, peering through the dark pathway to the front door and listening for anything outside. It was relatively quiet, excluding the light wind and occasional birdcall or cricket chirp.
After what was probably an hour or two, Blake heard a rustle of blankets behind her; she turned to see Carl stirring, his face slightly scrunched in pain. After a few moments, his eyes fluttered open. He peered around the room as he tried to get his bearings in the dark.
"Hey." Blake kept her voice low, not wanting to startle Carl or wake the sleeping adults upstairs. It reminded her of when she used to have sleepovers with her friends. It sucked that all of those friends were probably dead now. "You okay?"
Carl's eyes found hers in the dark. "Yeah." Blake could tell he wasn't, but bringing that up wouldn't accomplish much, so she left it. "How long have I been out?"
"A while." Blake turned and grabbed a water bottle off of the coffee table. "Here." She took the cap off and handed it to him.
"Do we have enough?" Carl took the water, propping himself up on one elbow to drink.
"Plenty." Blake smirked, knowing she would ask the exact same question if she was in Carl's position. "There's a river close by and we have the LifeStraw filter. We basically have an unlimited amount of water for as long as we stay here. Unless the river freezes, but that never happened in the time that I lived here."
"Good." Carl drank about a third of the water before handing it back to Blake, who replaced the cap and placed the container back on the table. "Is everyone okay?"
"Yeah." Blake leaned back against the table. "Michonne and your dad are asleep upstairs. Do you want me to go get him?"
"No, it's okay." Carl brushed the hair off his face and sighed.
"You okay?" Blake cocked her head slightly to the side, knowing for certain the he was not okay.
"Yeah, I'm fi-"
"Carl." Blake interrupted in a stern tone. "I mean it. Are you okay?"
He sighed again. "It hurts." He admitted.
"Well that's to be expected." Blake smirked slightly. "But that's not it." The teenager prided herself in her ability to read people. She'd been good at it ever since first grade, and her instincts had improved since the beginning of the apocalypse; they had to if she wanted to stay safe. "Seriously, dude. What's up?"
"I… I'm just thinking."
"About?"
"Everything." Carl looked at Blake, who tilted her head in curiosity again. "We had a bigger group, much bigger. We were in a prison. We had walls, fences, people; we were the safest we've been since this whole thing started. Another group wanted what we had. The leader of that group called himself the governor; he convinced the rest of his people to attack us. They destroyed everything. They knocked the fences down, blew up the walls, killed our people. Damn near killed my dad. They let walkers in. A walker…" Carl swallowed, fighting tears, "a walker killed my sister. The governor killed the man who saved my life, so many lives. We don't know if anyone else I alive. Seeing that other group this morning, it just reminded me how people react to this world. Shows me how much my dad has changed, how much everyone has changed. How much I've changed. It's terrifying. We can defend ourselves against the walkers, but people are another story. We can't defend ourselves against us. Against what we have to become to survive. I've killed countless walkers; things that used to be people. I've killed two people, maybe more. I couldn't tell who shot who during the prison attack. One of them was my own mother. I was with someone else, but I did it. It's me. I killed my mom." One tear slipped over Carl's lashes and he defiantly wiped it away.
"I lied." Blake whispered, staring down at her hands.
"What?" Carl asked, confused.
"When Rick asked me those questions. I lied."
TWDTWDTWDTWDTWD
"How many walkers have you killed?" Rick asked, staring Blake in the eye.
"Too many to count." She replied. It was probably ten or more per day since she lost her parents.
"How many people have you killed?" Was the next question.
Blake thought for a moment before answering. "Four." She said in the same tone she used for the first answer.
"Why?"
"Pity, and self-preservation." She said. "You can't make it now without getting blood on your hands."
TWDTWDTWDTWDTWD
"I've killed more than four people." Blake admitted in a voice that was little more than a whisper.
"How many?" Carl asked cautiously.
"Thirteen." Blake could feel the tears pooling behind her eyes. "Thirteen before I was with you."
"Why?" Carl's voice was at the same volume as Blake's now.
"It's a long story. A long, complicated, inexcusable story."
"Well, we've got time." Carl pointed out. "Try me. I've seen and heard more than I ever expected to."
"Well…" Blake took a breath trying to figure out where to start. "Early on the government came through here, clearing everyone out. We left, went to a so-called safe zone. We stayed for maybe three weeks, but then the government started clearing out. They just left. So we did too. We figured it was only a matter of time before people turned against each other or walkers came through. There would have been no way out if that happened. It was okay for a while. Dad killed the walkers, mom kept inventory of everything and figured out what we needed to find and I watched Tegan; made sure she stayed quiet, ran way or hid, didn't eat anything that she found, things like that. For a month or so, we were fine. We didn't go hungry, we always had water, we didn't run into any bad people, we were almost safe. My mom refused to kill the walkers. She didn't understand that they were dead. Thought they were… people. She just ran away while my dad killed them. One time when she ran away, she ran right into one. She got bit before anyone could get to her. Twice. I found her by her screams, stabbed the walker, kept Tegan from seeing it. My dad couldn't do it, so… I had to shoot her. I don't think she was eve dead yet. It was the first walker I killed. The first time I fired a gun." Blake was having more and more trouble keeping her tears from falling. "A few weeks later, we ran into a big group of them; too big to run away. My dad ran into them, just yelling at me to keep Tegan safe. We ran. I had to explain to her where dad was. Why he wasn't with us anymore. He had always come back before, always found us. He wouldn't this time. I knew, but Tegan kept asking me when he was coming back." Blake took a moment, gathering her composure so as not to burst into tears. She hadn't cried in at least a year. She wasn't starting again now. "I kept her safe for a while, but… she was too trusting. She was smart enough, knew the walkers were bad, we stayed away from those. I killed them when they got too close. It didn't bother me much. But… I couldn't always keep her safe. I was killing some, lost track of her. After they were dead I found her, hiding out in a bush, covered in blood. One bit her. She killed it. She killed it with the knife I gave her. This knife." Blake pulled a miniature dagger form her boot. She hadn't touched it in months, kept it concealed, just in case. She turned it over in her hands while she spoke. "I couldn't protect her." The tears finally spilled, and Blake let them she didn't wipe them away, she just let all of her supressed emotion that had built up over the past year and a half out. "I put her down too. Wouldn't let her become one of them. That was two people I killed. I went mad. Hunted walkers down to kill them, to make them pay for what they did to people. Until I found people. I had this gun by then." She gestured with the weapon. "I was running through the wood, slicing walkers down then ran onto a camp. It didn't register that they were people until they were dead. I think they might've tried to help me, but I wouldn't let them. I killed them all. I don't even remember doing it, I just remember opening my eyes to all of the bodies. The gun was in my hands. All because I couldn't protect my little sister. I killed eleven strangers because I couldn't protect Tegan."
Well that was a soliloquy if I've ever written one... I might be able to use that for my monologue next semester.
Again, my apologies for the late update, school is just very time consuming near the end of the semester.
Please review! PM me if you have any questions, or if you have any suggestions for what I should put into the story, or if you just want to chat about TWD during its hiatus!
