"You're not gonna say goodbye?"

Carl. Of course he'd come after me, of course he'd come find me sulking out here on the catwalk even though the sun combined with my rapid heartbeat are making me all too hot. No, wait, I'm not sulking. I'm not, I'm . . . simmering. I'm simmering. Because I'm pissed as hell, and even more worried than that. But pissed as hell is easier to express, which is why I look at Carl and hiss, "No, I'm not gonna say goodbye. They shouldn't be goin' and you know it. Not like this."

He gazes out at the courtyard, which the wood pallets across from me hide from my view. I hear them, though. My dad and Rick and Hershel and whoever's out there helping them get ready. There's a car pulling around, there's Rick talking. There's the clack . . . clack of Hershel's crutches. Carl tips the brim of his hat lower. Then he comes and sits next to me. "Our dads know what they're doing."

"They need more people, not just the three of them, it's stupid –"

"My dad –"

"And none of them have gone face-to-face with the Governor before, not really. My dad was too busy fighting Merle and some walkers, and your dad was too busy getting us out of that damn arena! They should take Merle. Or Maggie. Or me. Someone who's at least talked to him before –"

"Sydney, they're going no matter what you think," Carl says, and I stop, catch my breath, and I want to be mad at him for saying that but I'm already too mad at other things to make room. And anyway . . . He's right.

Andrea came back to the prison yesterday. She came back to the prison, and she had a message from the Governor. He's willing to talk to Rick about the issues, she said, meet with him on neutral ground at this abandoned plant. And Rick, Rick decided he'd go, which I find questionable in its own right, because haven't we been gearing up for war? Isn't it a little late to talk truces or whatever? But then Rick said he'd take my dad and Hershel. One fighter and a crippled old man . . . That's it. And that's crazy. Because the Governor can't be taken at his word. Not at all. The Governor is a psycho bastard who for all we know could be bringing in his whole freaking army to take out Dad and Rick and Hershel, and they won't stand a chance, not just the three of them. And it terrifies me. And last night I told them that, and then I stormed away, and not even my dad chewed me out for it, which I think just goes to show that everyone knows I'm right about this. So why won't they listen?

My dad's motorcycle starts up below. The sound makes me tense, makes it hard to breathe. And I'm sick of being worried, I'm sick of it. I worry about everything, really, but it's different, it's worse, when my dad's going somewhere and I'm not. Even when Carl was gone on that run alone – or, without me – it wasn't as bad as this, because it was just a run, and most runs are pretty cut-and-dry. Meeting with the Governor? That ain't cut-and-dry.

The motorcycle and the car start to drive, start to leave. Their passengers start to leave. There's the rattling sound of the gate and Carl and I just listen to the fading engines until we can't hear them anymore. I'm biting into my knuckle at this point. I feel skin break.

"Syd, they'll get back. Hey." Carl leans forward, puts himself in my line of vision. His eyes are earnest. "They'll get back."

He can almost make me sure of it. Almost.

He eventually coaxes me off of the catwalk, back inside, where it's nice and cool and filled with the sounds of guns being handled and a baby crying her eyes out. Carl and me, we opt for the baby, mostly for my benefit, I think. I pick Judith up and sway – I'm good at it now – and let Carl go for a bottle down in the dining room-turned-armory. When Rick said he and Carl and Michonne were going on a run, he didn't mean just your usual food-and-supplies run. He took them back to his hometown, aiming to get some guns from Rick's old police station, but the place was cleaned out already. They ran into the man who helped Rick out in the early days, though, right after he woke up from the coma. Morgan, I think that was the man's name. But Morgan apparently went more or less bat shit crazy and hoarded tons and tons of weapons. Rick got him to hand them over, though. Which is good, we needed weapons, and my dad even got a new crossbow out of the deal. But there's something I don't like about the inside of the prison being a part of the gear-up-for-war plan. The outside's one thing, but where we sleep, where it's supposed to feel like home . . . ?

"It ain't fun, is it, Judith?" I murmur to her. "It ain't fun at all."

Her fingers wrap around some of my hair and she tugs hard on it, like she's saying No, no, Sydney. You can't let them do this.

"But there might be a war. We gotta gear up for the war . . ."

Carl comes up the stairs with the bottle and I hand his sister over. I like watching him with her, anyway. He rocks her, feeds her, says soothing things, and my eyes move between her face and his and then to the picture sitting near the top of the crib. Her crib. Carl got it while they were on the run. And that picture, too, which is a picture from some restaurant Carl and Lori and Rick used to go to all the time. It's the three of them, but Carl bothered to go get the picture because Lori's in it. And I can see Lori in Judith, I can. And I can see her in Carl. I almost say something about it but don't. Our moms . . . The one subject we still can't prod much.

He gets Judith to quiet down, Carl does, because he has a gift. Then, without me having to say it, he knows I'm ready, and so he puts her in the crib and leads me down and into the dining room. In all of its glory.

There's a huge wooden table – we found it tucked into a corner of the courtyard – sitting in the middle of the room now. And it's covered in guns, guns of all types. Pistols. Rifles. Shotguns. A bow, too, but Dad says if I ever do manage to get big enough to use it it'll take a few years. But yes, the surface of the table can barely be seen. We got ammo, too. And I know this is a good thing, I know this is what we needed.

But still. This is where we eat. And the arsenal being in here . . . It makes me uneasy.

Glenn and Maggie and Beth and Michonne are all sorting through the guns. Cleaning, loading, checking for damage. Merle's in here, but he's over in his corner. Just watching. He looks at me when I look at him and I quickly look away, grab a handgun, a semiautomatic that's too heavy for me but that I pretend to be fascinated by.

Glenn calls Carl over to him. Glenn. With Rick and Dad and Hershel all gone, he's in charge here, and I'd follow Glenn any day, but he's stressed. Anyone can tell he's stressed. And he and Maggie are still weird. He hands Carl a box of bullets now. "You stash these at the loading dock, alright? Beth – put more up on the catwalk. If anyone gets pinned down, we need to make sure that they have plenty of ammo."

Which is a great idea, unless you like arrows. I look at the gun in my hand, frowning, thinking of how bad my aim was the last time I shot a gun, when the walkers came in –

No. Not going there. My hands find bullets and I go to loading the pistol. A simple, easy process, good and mind-numbing.

"I'll go work on the cage outside," says Glenn, and I'm not sure what he's planning on doing, but he has a blowtorch in his hand. Just as he starts for the steps, though, Merle talks.

"What we should be doin'," is how he begins, pointing his metal arm at the arsenal before us, "Is loadin' some of this firepower in a truck, and payin' a visit to the Governor. We know where he is right now."

I close my eyes and the picture of a limp Governor with an arrow for a second eyeball fills my mind.

"You're suggesting that we just go in and kill him?" says Glenn. You can still hear it in his voice. How much he hates Merle, I mean. Carl's stopped, turned, because he wants to watch the show.

"Yeah, I am," answers my uncle. And I'm not one to agree with him, but it's not a bad idea, Glenn, it's not a bad idea –

Michonne now. To Merle. "We told Rick and Daryl that we'd stay put."

Right. Right, yes, we did. I lower my head, because no matter how wrong I think their call was, I can't just say screw it and do whatever the hell I want. That's not how this works, it can't work that way.

But Merle doesn't get that. "I changed my mind, sweetheart. Bein' on the sideline with my brother out there . . . It ain't sittin' right with me."

I put the gun back on the table, harder than I need to. Because now he's such a loyal brother? Now he wants to swoop in and protect Dad?

"The three of them are right in the middle of it," says Glenn. "No idea we're coming – they could get taken hostage or killed. A thousand things could go wrong."

"And they will!"

Carl moves forward then, looking right at my uncle. "My dad can take care of himself." Then he heads for the door, just that simple.

"Sorry, son," Merle calls after him, "But your dad's head could be on a pike real soon."

Carl doesn't look back. I wait until he's out of the room before I tell Merle, "Don't say things like that to him."

"What, Princess, you think your dad's gonna be any different if we just leave 'em out there?"

Screw the arsenal. I can't deal with him. "And don't say things like that to me." And I walk away.

For an hour or so, I waste time reading the novel Glenn got for me the day Merle kidnapped us. It's a crappy thriller, not good at all, but it's new, so I read away, convincing myself that I'm into it when really I just want to be out of what's going on around me.

But I can't be, not for long. Because eventually I hear raised voices coming from the dining room. And I have to go see what's happening. Like a car wreck, like a car wreck.

" . . . Michonne can do it, why can't you?" is the first thing I can really make out. And it's Maggie saying it. And by the time I get in the doorway and can see into the room, Merle's yelling back from the other side of the weapon table.

"'Cause it's my brother out there, that's why!"

He has a bag. Filled up and bulky. The butt of a rifle is sticking out of the opening, and I get it, I get what he's doing, and something cold spreads out through me and I quietly say, "And it's my dad."

Michonne, Maggie, Glenn, and Merle. That's who's in here. That's who I feel staring at me. Well, no. I see Merle staring at me. I'm staring right back. Like it's just him and me. "And I'm stayin' here, anyway," I say, still speaking all low, still feeling cold inside.

My uncle points at me. Sort of. It's with his metal arm, which has a new blade duct-taped to it. "Don't get me started on you, missy. You tried to stab me. You don't know the first thing 'bout takin' care of your family."

As far as I know, nobody else knew anything about the shard, my escape attempt. Not until now. And I might have focused in on him bringing that up, if it hadn't been for that last sentence, because that last sentence, that's all that matters now. "Takin' care of my family?" I move around Maggie – dodging her hand, ignoring her saying my name – and around the table, to where I'm right in front of my uncle, and I say, "Don't you talk 'bout takin' care of family."

"Sydney Rose –"

"Tell me somethin'!" The cold in me is so cold, so cold . . . no, not cold. Not cold at all. Burning hot. White hot, and it rises in me and – "Where the hell was this protectin' your brother idea when your dad was –"

I would've stopped there anyway, I hope, my insides white hot or not. Because that's nothing the group should ever hear about, at least not from me. But Merle is what actually stops me. Him taking my arm, yanking me to him, leaning down to me so our faces, our blue eyes, are inches apart. That's what stops me. "You weren't there! You don't know! You don't know –"

Then he's gone and his hand lets me go and Glenn's hitting him and Maggie's hauling me back and Merle and Glenn are throwing punches on the floor and Michonne's trying to break them up and then there's a bang and Beth's pointing a smoking gun at the ceiling and Merle's saying Let me go, let me go! and he's getting to his feet and so is Glenn but Merle's the one looking at me and Maggie puts her arm protectively over my chest but Merle doesn't step closer, just says through clenched teeth, "You ain't got no idea what I've done to protect your dad! What I've done to protect you! You ain't got no idea!"

And whatever delusion he has in his head, whatever he's thinking he's been so gracious about, I don't want to hear it. "Go to hell, Merle," I whisper. And as I shrug off Maggie and move away, I add, "Just don't take my dad or Rick or Hershel or any one of us with you."

The first tear streaks down my hot face then, but at least I managed to hide them until he couldn't see my face anymore.

"You're as bitchy as your mama, you know that? You hear me, you ungrateful –"

And the white hot in me turns to an explosion and I try to run back to him, screaming You son'bitch, just shut up, but Maggie's pushing me, pulling me, dragging me towards my cell and saying panicky words and I just shrug her off again, angrily this time, and my legs move, they carry me and carry me and carry me until I'm out on the catwalk and there's nothing but the white noise of the walkers and I sit and curl up in a ball and the white hot freezes over again and the ice cracks and I cry but don't sob, I won't sob, I won't let myself, not because of Merle. He won't make me that pathetic. He won't. And some time later Carl's appeared beside me and I put my face in between his shoulder and the fence so I'm hidden and he and I stay there and stay there until the distant rumble of a motorcycle touches our ears.