A/N: Hello world and all who inhabit it! Yet again, please don't kill me for getting this out so late. I'm hoping to get an ATUAL schedule for chapters, just know that this time I have a good excuse for getting this out late! I went to Vermont for a week with NO access to my Netflix, so it was physically impossible for me to do this. Buut, now that I'm back I'll (hopefully,) get back on track!

Here you guys go!

"You know, bears... When they start to starve, they eat their young. If the bear dies, the cub does anyway. But if the bear lives, they can always have another cub."

What the fuck? What am I hearing?

"That was part of the pitch." What pitch? Who are you?

My head throbs painfully. I can't open my eyes, the pain is just too much, but I can hear voices. Most are muffled, quiet. Like whispers. I can hear chewing, lots of it. It sounds like meat, or something tough. Then, there's one voice that rings out above the rest. Who are you? Why do I know you?

"I like women better. Most of us do. My brother Alex has- also currently DEAD because of Rick- had a theory that it was because of the extra layer of fat that women have. You know, for childbearing. Even the skinny girls have it. Like that pretty one... Sasha?"

Sasha? How do you know Sasha?

Then my memories coming flashing back to me. The dinner, Abrahams speech, Bob walking out of the church. I remember the slash that I saw in the tree bark, then the smash of something hard against the back of my head.

"I think pretty people taste better too."

I groan, and a wave of pain shoots through my head. I slowly open my eyes, taking a look around me. Everything is a blur of colors, and the only thing I can make out is a fire to my right.

"Oh, you're awake." I can hear Gareth somewhere to my left, and I lean to the voice. My head bumps against something hard. Bob's shoulder. "Do I need to repeat my speech, or do you get the gist of it?"

I wrinkle my nose in disgust as the blobs of color form in front of me. "I got most of it." I try to move my hands, but they're bound together by rope around the pole my back is against. "You know, I really hate being taken prisoner. Kinda just ruins my day."

Gareth, as he takes a bite of some piece of meat, gives a dry chuckle. "Yeah, well, Rick and your group killing my brother kinda ruins mine."

I pull against the restraints, seeing if I can jiggle at all. I can't, and huff in annoyance.

"You're not getting out." Gareth tells me. "We're pretty good at what we do. And that includes keeping our prisoners detained."

"Asshole." I mutter under my breath.

"Hey, I'm just being civil here. I'm talking to you, not just killing you." He shrugs his shoulders. I look around him, trying to map out where we are. I see a red brick building behind him, plenty of walkers trapped inside. I can faintly hear them groaning as they push against the glass. There's people hanging out by the fire, seven, I count, not including Gareth. Though there could be more hiding, keeping an eye on us at the church.

My heart stings as I think about the feast we were having. My initial thought is, Mom's gonna killlll me. I shake it off, though. My worry won't help me here. I need to keep a level head, or there's no way Bob and I can escape.

My eyes go back to the group, and I look at the fire. Above it, resting on a chunk of an old shopping cart, is a leg. I gasp at it and gag at the sight. Bob's leg. Shit. And as my eyes roam around the men of the group, I realize they're eating it. Ugh. And then I think, Why didn't you get me?

"Bob?" My voice catches in my throat. I twist my neck to look at him and sure enough, only his left thigh remains attached from the original whole. His whimpers of pain rip through me like a chainsaw.

"As you can tell, we didn't get you." Gareth starts. "Yet. We're gonna get all of you. But for starters, Bob will do just fine. We did a good job on his leg. We've had practice. When we started, it was about making this slow."

Through Gareth's words, Bob continues to sob. Or, so I think. I can't tell if he's crying or laughing. Maybe both?

Gareth just shakes his head in disappointment. "I'm being a human being here. I'm talking to you. Perspective, Bob. You're above ground. At least you're better off than them."

And then, I hear laughing, clear as a bell. Straight from Bob. I turn as well as I can to look at him as his laughs grow louder and more uncontrolled.

"Well, he lost it." One of the henchmen say. They all stand and move to Gareth so they can get a good look at their meal losing his mind.

"Bob?" I ask, and push my shoulder against his. He doesn't seem to notice, or he doesn't care. His shrill laughs continue.

"He lasted longer than I thought he would." Another henchmen says, taking a big chunk out of their hunk of Bob-ecue. Oh god. I feel like shit for making that pun.

"You..." He continues to laugh as he looks to Gareth and his posse. "Idiots!"

"Okay, keep it down." Gareth just rolls his eyes.

Bob grabs at his shoulder, pulling down the cloth from his shirt and jacket. Though I don't see all of it, I can see the teeth marks and the blood that stains the chocolate skin. "I've been bitten, you stupid pricks! I'm tainted meat."

He laughs at the phrase. My heart drops for him. All of the Termites groan in disgust. The meat in their hands is immediately dropped and many turn their heads so they can puke what they ate. The smell of barf enters my nostrils, and it takes what willpower I have left to not do the same.

"I'm tainted meat!" He giggles uncontrollably. The group around him stares at him in disgust. "Tainted meat!"

"Let's just kill him now." One of them suggests, yanking out a knife from his sheath.

"No no, we need him." Gareth pushes against the guy, keeping him at a safe distance from Bob.

"We might as well be eating one of them!" The Termite yells out.

"What the hell's gonna happen?!" One of them, younger than most, seems to be in the midst of a panic attack. "Are we gonna turn? Are we just gonna die?"

"Albert, calm the hell down. We cooked him!" Gareth tries to reason, though he's barely heard over Bobs insistent laughing. "Everything is gonna be fine."

"Why the hell didn't you check him first?!" One asks.

"'Cause he was fine!"

"TAINTED MEAT!" Bob yells out.

"Shut up." Gareth says. I pull against the restraints, though it's useless. They did well.

"YOU'RE EATING TAINTED MEAT!"

"I said shut up!" And with the yell, Gareth kicks Bob in the face. I yelp in surprise as Bob lands in front of me, his back resting against my legs. I lean forward, taking a look at him. He's knocked out cold.

"Grab him." Gareth tells to his henchmen. Two, though seemingly unwilling helpers, grab Bob off the ground.

"What're you gonna do with him?" I ask quickly, my voice shaking.

"Teach your little friends at the church a lesson." Gareth grins at his words.

Back at the church, many are in a state of panic. Four people missing. Daryl, Carol, Alyssa, Bob. Michonne and Sasha, heavily armed, scope out the front of the church while Rick, Glenn, and Maggie search through the back. They come up empty handed.

Though Michonne is freaking out, Rick keeps a level head. If the situation wasn't as dire, he might've laughed. Apparently, Alyssa can't go two whole days without being in some form of captivity.

As he and his posse travel to the front, Sasha and Michonne tell him that there was someone watching the group. Sasha seems keen on following them.

Though it hurts for her to say it, Michonne says, "We can't follow him." She knows that blindly going after the four of them wouldn't end well.

"Bob and Alyssa are out there somewhere. Alone, scared. They need us!" Sasha argues, her heart rate going a million miles an hour.

"If we leave now, some of us aren't coming back." Glenn says calmly. "We don't know how many people there are, or how they're armed. It's a suicide mission."

"Glenn's right." Rick agrees. "We need to get our heads together, think of somethin'."

Though she wants to run right through the bushes to follow that scout, Sasha gives a shaky nod. "Fine. Anyone else missing?"

As they walk to the church, he answers. "Just the four."

This is not how the group wanted to start their first night at the church. No one in the team wants Sasha to yell at Father Gabriel, saying how he's a traitor. How he has spies watching them. No one wants to hear him break down, crying that he locked his doors at night, letting hundreds of innocent people die in the first few days of the apocalypse. No one wants to know he is as good as a killer, just like the rest of them.

And no one wants to see Bob being left in the dirt at the front of the church, one calf cut off and bleeding. Nor do they want to see the large chunk of skin missing from his shoulder.

My head is spinning, mapping out a dozen ways to try to escape. They all end with me dead.

I tug against the restraints on my hands for what feels like the billionth time. There's no way I'm getting out of them, but it's the one thing I have in my power to do. Gareth sits in front of me, relaxing beside the fire. Every time he hears me tug against the ropes, his response is automatic. "You're not going anywhere. Don't even try."

"Asshole." I growl in response. I search around the group, but none of them (besides Gareth,) even bother to look at me. They're all worried about their infectious dinner.

"You really don't understand the term, 'civil,' do you?" He cocks his head to the side, giving me a thoughtful-yet-annoyed look.

"Oh, it's in my vocabulary. Right next to, 'fuck you,' and, 'I don't give a rats ass.'"

His brows raise in surprise and he gives me a respectful nod. "I didn't think you'd be so fiesty. Hell, I thought you'd crack down the second you saw Bob legless."

"It takes a lot to scare me." I challenge, though inwardly I'm screaming. I hope he doesn't notice my bravado.

"How about this to scare you?" He stands up from the fire, moving over to me. "We drop Bob off with your friends. He tells them everything he knows. They all run here to save you. Meanwhile, five of us go to the church. We pick off the weak ones they left behind. The priest, the baby, the mullet guy, your little boyfriend?" I glare up at him, but all he does in response is smile. "We kill them first. The three of us that stay here? We wait until your people show up. We kill you in front of them, and we kill them, too. All of our problems go bye-bye."

My eyes drop to the ground, and my heavy pants pick up. He continues, "The second my buddies come back from dropping Bob off, that plan gets put into effect. And we know how noble your friends are. They'd want to get you first before killing us. That puts them right in the crossfire."

I clench my jaw tight at his words. It's an air-tight plan. We always go after our own.

Instead of giving in to the spiral of despair that he wants me to be in, I look up to him. My scowl slowly twists into a crazed smirk. "You think you have it all planned out, don't you?"

"Well, I don't mean to brag, but we've followed your posse everywhere. We know what to expect."

I give a shake of my head, and a laugh escapes my throat. "You don't know SHIT."

Just then, two men erupt from the forest, panting heavily. They are the ones that brought Bob back to my family.

"I think this is my cue to exit." Gareth gives a wry smile to me. He goes to my left and grabs a rifle. Four of his looney friends follow suit. As he grabs a magazine, he looks to me as he clicks it in. "Let's see how much shit I know."

I don't say anything. Instead, I glare at him and his group as he leaves me and three of his people behind. I listen to the sound of their footsteps through the forest, though there's not many. They understand stealth well. And that's what worries me.

Once the five of them leave, the rest of us are silent. I wouldn't be surprised if we could hear a pin dropping 20 miles away. Either these three don't care to talk or their tongues are cut out.

I think about my group. If what Gareth told me was true, then they'll all be on shit-city soon. It feels like Gareth and his Termites left about an hour ago, though I can't really tell. I can't hear anything around me, so I take it as a good sign. That maybe my group hasn't been touched yet.

My mind goes back to planning. I can't leave my spot. Not on my own. I don't have any weapons on me. Before I was captured, my knife rested in its sheath. Now, I see it in the hands of the goon closest to me. He's cleaned the blood off of it, and it almost shines in the campfire light.

I draw a blank in my escape plans. Instead, I quietly hum to myself to soothe my nerves. I close my eyes and breathe deeply through my nose, all the while humming, "Highway to Hell," from ACDC.

"Shut up." A girl, sitting a few feet away from the campfire tells me.

"Why?" I ask, grinning. This is how I piss them off.

"Because I don't need to hear you. I need to hear people running." She says. Her voice is gravely and scratchy; the sound of a smoker for who knows how long.

"But I want to hum." I say again, this time humming, "Under Pressure," by Queen, just a teeny bit louder than I was before.

She rolls her eyes. "Shut. Up. Stupid little kid."

"Oh, I'm not stupid." I grin again. "I just have selective hearing."

My humming gets louder as I switch to, "Mr. Tambourine Man," by Bob Dylan. One of the other Termites groan as the girl huffs and walks away from me in response.

I pout to her. "Oh, you're no fun." She gives me the middle finger in response.

I sarcastically go, "Oh, ouch. The pain! The misery! All because I want a little background music. Seems a bit too harsh of a response, doesn't it?"

The one holding my knife seems done with my antics. With a growl, he grabs a handgun from his holster.

"Do you see this?" He growls the clenched teeth. "Do you fucking see this?"

I shrug my shoulders. "I think my answer is a yes."

"This is a .44 Magnum, and right now there's four bullets in it. Unless you want one of them in your skull, I suggest you shut your goddamn mouth."

"You're not gonna shoot me." I say, sweetly smiling to him. He looks like he wants to break my arms. "You need me, don't you?"

"Doesn't mean we need you ALIVE."

This shuts me up. Or, so they think. Now I play the part of a hurt victim. The smile drops from my face and I look to the dirt on the ground. "Fine." I whisper out. "You win." I don't look up to see the grin on his face, which is undoubtedly there. I hear the sound of the gun being put back in the holster, and I pretend to give a breath of relief.

I stay quiet for a few minutes, allowing them faux peace. I want them to be just the right amount of annoyed. Not too much, not too less.

When I deem it safe enough to talk, I whine out, "I need to pee."

The statement earns groans from all three of them.

"OhmyGOD, kid."

"Are you serious?!"

"You gotta be kidding me!"

I give a sheepish smile to them. "Sorry. I don't want to, but I need to."

"Sucks to be you." The girl tells me. "We're not moving you. No way in hell."

"Only for three seconds!" I whine again. "What could I possibly do in three seconds?"

"Oh, after all that big talk to Gareth earlier?" She counters. "You seem capable to me."

I shrug my head. "It was all a bluff. At least about me. Seriously. I have no weapons, no one to help me. My hands are tied behind my back! What could I do like this?" My voice comes out desperate, exactly what I want them to think.

"Shut the fuck up. We're not letting you." The one with my knife claims. The others agree with him.

"Please?" They all shake their heads. I gulp audibly, and think quickly. I need to get out of here somehow.

And I look to my legs. "I mean, if you guys won't move me, I guess I could just go here."

I hear them all, "ewww!" at my statement. Perfect.

"Well, if you guys won't let me pee out there then where else would I?" I counter. "Which means I'll stink up my spot. You'll all have to deal with the smell of piss for the night. Sound like fun to you?"

The girl gives a look to each of the boys. With a grumble, she points to the one holding my knife. "Untie her. Let her go near the trees."

He gives an audible huff of anger to her, but does as he's told. He cuts my restraints that hold me to the pole, but quickly ties my hands with new rope in front of me, giving himself a long strip of it. Like it's a leash. Ugh.

Once my restraints are deemed tight enough to him, he tugs on his strip harshly. "Come on."

I pretend to trip over my own two feet as I struggle to follow him. He pulls me along to a small part of the forest, concealed from the eyes of the others. The second we're out of the sight from the two Termites, the second part of my plan is put into effect. As he keeps walking us further and further, I talk quietly.

"I love the forest at night, don't you?" I aim my question at him, but I look to my knife that hangs loosely in his sheath.

"Shut up." He answers, which is the response I expected from him. It doesn't matter, though. All I need to do is distract him.

"No? Yes? I always enjoyed the way the moonlights shines through the leaves on top of the trees. It felt magical to me as a kid." I babble on, looking around his hip to the Magnum on the other side of him. "I mean, nowadays I'm more worried about the walkers that may or may not be in the dark, but still. The moonlight is super pretty."

He tugged me closer to him by the rope, angrily grabbing my wrist with his right fist. He hisses to me, "Do you WANT the biters to know we're here?!"

I shrug my shoulders and bite my bottom lip. "No..."

"Then shut up and keep moving." He lets my wrist go and drops the excess rope, turning. My heartbeat springs out of my chest as I realize, This is the moment.

"I want to distract you!" I bring both my fists up and connect them to his jaw, stunning him for a brief moment. The impact hurts my hands, but I don't stop my onslaught.

He drops my leash, hands automatically going up to his face to protect himself from another blow. But that's not where I aim next. Instead, I take my elbows as one entity and bring them to his neck, pushing him down to the ground. He quickly gasps for air and his hands try to pull me away, but my hands go to replace my elbows. They now dig into his ribcage. He wiggles beneath me, trying to get away. His legs move out in desperation to kick me, but I knee him in the gut.

I keep my hands around his neck with all my might. I hear him gasping and attempting to call out for his friends.

"Shuuuuut thefuckup." I hiss in his ear. In his desperation to get out from under me, my knife falls out of his sheath and onto the grass beside him. In what feels like a millisecond, I take my hands from his neck and grab the blade. He takes one last big gulp of air, and I stab my new weapon into his neck. His gulp turns in a wet gargle, and I look away from him. His body wriggles for only a few more seconds before it goes limp. When I turn back, his eyes are glassy and his mouth is drooling with blood.

I pant heavily, my breaths short and desperate after my kick of adrenaline. It worked!

As I lie on the ground beside his corpse, I set the knife on the ground and quickly push my rope back and forth against it, slowly but surely cutting the rope off my right hand. With my free hand, I pull at the knot on my right to untie it, and I'm finally free.

I weakly grab for the Termites .44 Magnum. I quickly open the chamber, expecting to see the four bullets he promised inside of it. I only find one.

"Shit!" I whisper to myself. I need at least two.

I grumble angrily as I close the chamber and put the single bullet into it. Standing up shakily, I take the weapons with me and begin to retrace the steps back to the camp, hoping somehow that this plan works in my favor.

When I find the school again, I hide against the wall and scoot to the corner. I look quickly to the two Termites left. The girl and guy seem antsy, but they're looking to the left of the campfire, not the right where I'm hidden. Then I hear it. The sounds of screaming in the distance. My heartbeat picks up, but then relaxes as I realize I don't hear any of my group. These screams are all foreign to me. They lost.

I switch the safety off on the gun and aim it at the man's head, and pull the trigger. The shot sounds defeating in my ears.

I quickly pull back against the wall and breathe heavily. What the fuck? I think to myself. That's the one shot I had.

I drop the gun and yank out my knife, holding it close to my side. The last Termite standing will come for me, most likely shooting at me. And all I have is my fucking knife.

I prepare myself to hear the sound of oncoming bullets from her rifle. I can already hear her angry steps in my direction, and the angry growl as she pulls up the rifle to aim. I close my eyes, breathing deeply as I await her gun.

But it never comes. I only hear the sound of a single silenced bullet, and a body hitting the ground heavily.

I crack an eye open, looking quickly to the woods in front of me. Nothing. What? So I turn to look at the small camp from my spot. The Termite is dead.

Confused, I look up from her body. And I grin. Through the trees, I see three people. Glenn, Maggie, and Tara.

"Glenn?" I gasp. "Maggie?"

I set the knife in my sheath and run to them across the courtyard. My arms go around Glenn the second I get to them, and he returns the gesture. Maggie's arms follow suit, holding me tight.

"Are you okay?" Glenn asks, looking down to me, pure concern in his brown eyes. I give a small, barely-there smile and nod.

"I am now." My grip tightens around his figure, and he does the same to me.

When we return to the group, many are already outside, moving the bodies of the Termites out to be burned. All of them are grotesque and broken. I don't even recognize Gareth anymore. All he is now is a pile of bloody mush.

"Mom?" The second I see her in the doorway, I run to her. "Mom!"

Her eyes light up as they see me, and relief fills her features. She runs to me too, and at the first step of the church we meet each other. I hug her as tightly as I physically can, just like she's doing to me.

"What part of, 'I'm not letting you out of my sight,' do you not understand?!" She says to me, pulling away for a nanosecond to kiss my cheek.

"Apparently all of it." I admit.

"You're grounded." She says, pulling me in tight again. "Forever."

I laugh at her comment. "Okay, mom."

When we break apart (and it's not easy to,) we go back to the others and help them with the rest of the bodies. Come morning, the bodies are burned and some supplies are packed for Abraham's journey to get Eugene to DC. Though I wasn't there for the discussion of said journey, Glenn pulled me aside from the group this morning to explain to me that he and Maggie are going with them. They were part of the deal that the ginger made with Rick.

"No." I say, refusing to believe it. "No, you two can't go-"

"I'm sorry, Alyssa." He interrupts. "But we're going. We have to."

I clamp my mouth shut, my brain going a thousand miles a minute. I don't trust my mouth, so instead I give him another death-grip hug like last night.

"Don't die out there." I tell him, my voice cracking. "Don't you dare die on us."

"I won't. I promise." He answers, sounding so sure of it. I'm reluctant to let go, but I do and we head to the others.

The next thing on the groups list is to say our goodbyes to Bob. We all crowd around him, saying how good of a person he is and how we'll all miss him. And all of this is true. He is a good man, and he doesn't deserve this.

I don't know him much, so I settle for standing in the back of the group with Carl and giving Bob a strong nod while those closest to him paid their respects. And when his time comes, we all go outside to help dig his grave.

Sasha, when she was ready to come out, insisted on her digging the rest of it and making his cross, so we go inside to grab the supplies for the Abraham and Co. group. He and Rosita go around the church to grab their short bus.

When it's around front, Abraham gives Rick a map. "This is our route to DC. We'll stick to it as long and we're able. If not, well, you got our destination. Once Eugene gets to the big brains left up there, things are gonna bounce back. This group should be there for it. You should be there for it."

"They will be." Maggie says, giving a sweet smile to Rick and mom.

"We will." Mom nods.

Rick looks to her and smiles at the words. "We will."

Abraham nods to the words before turning to his bus. "Let's go."

Eugene, Rosita, Maggie, and Glenn all hop into the back of the bus, and Abraham to the drivers seat. The rest of our group looks to them, attempting to look happy for the departures but we all look solemn. And when the bus drives away, I look down to the dirt beneath my feet. I don't want to see my friends leaving me. The thought of them being gone already crushes my heart.

I feel a light kick against my shoe, and I look back up to see Carl.

"You okay?" He asks, his voice quiet. I look back to the short bus, already halfway down the dirt street.

"No, I'm not." I answer truthfully. His hand grabs mine and holds it tightly. I return the grip.

"Me neither."

A/N: Yay, another chapter done! Feel free to tell me what you guys think about it! Reviews and PMs are always welcome here.