I arrived in the run-down southern suburbia long after the sun had set. I hadn't seen many shufflers, and I had so much blood on my face and clothes they wouldn't have bothered me anyway. Smell of it didn't bother me either.

The light of the moon guided me to a white house with a wrap-around porch and the promise of shelter and maybe a can of beans. I stepped in, axe out, over my head and at the ready. The door had already been broken into once and opened with minor effort. Shut it behind me. Couldn't risk more shufflers. The windows were blocked by dark blankets. No light. Not a single shuffle or gargle either. A couch was propped up against the door in the living room. Whoever was here last was desperate for shelter no matter how little it was. Heaven help them if they were still here, alive or dead.

I held onto the railing as I climbed up to the second floor. The floorboards gave a small squeak under me. I paused. A resounding rustle went through the staircase to my ears. Not slow and creeping but fast and scattering. Probably a spooked rodent, or some bird of prey catching itself a meal.

The bedroom right in front of me was first. My hand glazed over the moulding as I crossed the threshold. Some streaks of moonlight shone through the windows and lit up the indigo blue walls. There were some video games on the floor, a guitar on the shelf, books on the bed, posters coating the walls and dvd cases scattered across the room. It seemed like it hadn't so much as been touched since this whole thing started.

I had this. Only one day ago. I had a small cell, clad in a beautiful mess of books and tempura painted walls with an old bed sheet as my only door. I was going to go on a run with him, find a Rita Hayworth poster and see if anyone else would be in on the joke. They even had that book in the library there. The library that we'd found together.

It was probably like this now. Still burning, maybe. How quickly it had changed. First, a roaring pinnacle, symbolizing a new age, next a funeral pyre within a tomb. And now it was just like this, a mere echo of what once was. And he was there, too. As time passed his flesh would mould with the very ground that we tilled and it is where he'd remain, clawing in desperation for flesh. It wasn't him anymore either. Just a shell. Just like this room. A testament... no, a gospel, written in blood and dirt and fire, humanity's greatest failure.

"It's not up to me! There's a council now! They run this place!"

He looked like some kind of martyr, barking off like that.

The other man was on a tank. He was tall, dark hair. And an eye patch? Little too old to be playing fucking pirate…

They pulled out two of their people. The kindly old man and the last samurai. They were forced to kneel. I could hear the younger blonde girl whimper behind me. The message was clear and simple: "your move".

He looked to the man with the crossbow first. He nodded. He patted his son on the shoulder as the hat tilted down to his brown hiking shoes then up again.

Then he turned to me.

There it was again. That little spark inside that blue. He wasn't… yeah. He was going to go down there. There was something that was unsettling in the way that he waited for me to approve. But I didn't approve. That wasn't the answer. Whoever this asshole with a fucking armored vehicle was, he wanted nothing but blood. Seeking shelter was just a charade. He wouldn't leave until he was the last man standing.

Just like the man with the knife.

I could have told Rick. I could have learned something in that gaze. I could have found something I thought I'd lost for good. I could have come clean. I could have come back.

But did I?

I nodded my head.

His hand went for my shoulder, and I thought I'd feel the familiar grip of his hand. I did, at the base of my neck. It lingered there one too many seconds as I let him push aside the chain link.

The man with the crossbow told me to make sure the others knew to get on the bus if my instinct didn't fail me. I would. But no one said that I had to be on it too. How I felt about them, how I felt about Ri-… how I felt about them didn't matter. Not anymore. Numero uno. That was the game.

I slipped away to my cell. My bag lay underneath, as it had for the past several months, waiting patiently for this exact moment to arise.

That's when I heard the first shots. There wasn't even a build to it. Silence and then bullets whizzing everywhere. I unsheathed the blade of my axe. It was time to go.

D block is where I slipped away. The shufflers would be drawn to the gunfire. I ran hard and fast, so much so that the walkers that I did run into didn't even get a chance to chomp their bits at me. Finally I arrived at the first fence. With a couple of quick slashes of my axe, I cut through, and all there was left between me and freedom was the front yard.

I ran. My feet carried me fast over the grass. I tried not to look back. I didn't need to. I could still hear the fires burning, the heat still left of my skin. Bullets were flying with abandon, men and women barking orders to one another trying to act like this was more civilized than manslaughter. And the moment I forgot to remind myself not to, my head of it's own accord turned. And there, a few feet next to the prison bus was the man with the eye-patch. He was on top of him, throwing down his fist into a bloodied mess on the ground.

I turned back after that. It was too late for him. For all of them. That didn't stop something deep inside me from lurching up into my throat. But there was nothing I could do.

At the last fence I stepped out and I didn't stop running, not even when m y heart was beating with rigorous thuds, and my legs couldn't keep up with the pace of it.

"I'm sorry, Rick." I found myself wailing, sobs leaving my chest without any sense checking them.

"I'm so sorry. I should have done something. I shouldn't have left."

My anguish was met with a shuffle. A creak in the stairs sounded. My heart leaped, and I aimed for my knife, but soon found my hand slipping to my side-arm.

It was the first time I had ever thought about it. I took it from my jeans and held it. I ran my thumb over the trigger. I had four, maybe five bullets left. Nobody would miss one of them. Not even me. It'd be so easy. It'd be quick. Rick wouldn't have thought about this. He wouldn't have. He was all tooth and nail, right up until lungs filled with blood and his eyes couldn't open.

But Rick was gone. They were all gone. And what was I to do? Traverse the endless wild hoping that I'd find another group only to watch it deteriorate and wither away until we were no better than the shufflers themselves? That fight wasn't in me. Not any more. It died with him. Maybe we could argue about who was right in the great beyond.

The round hole was cool and soothing against my temple. It ground against my hair, whispering. It promised no more pain, no more heartbreak, no more thought. Just peace.

And I believed it.

"I'm sorry."

"Tess?"

My breath hitched, and my arm dropped with the weight of the gun.

A bright-eyed boy stood gun fixed at me ready to shoot. My stomach twisted.

"Carl?"

He uncocked and lowered his gun, switching on the safety. Fresh tears stained his cheeks and more threatened to come. I'd be lying if I said that the same couldn't be said for myself.

"Oh my god."

I staggered over, wiping away the old salt from my cheeks and gripped him tightly to me.

"You're alive. You made it out alive."

I let go of him and gripped his shoulder.

"Yeah, we did."

"We?"

"Dad's downstairs." I couldn't restrain my brief smile.

"But he's not doing so good. He's been out for more than a day. Maybe you could take a look at him?"

I nodded.

"Yeah, of course."

We crawled down the stairs. He led me into the living room that I was so certain had been abandoned.

He was on the couch propped up against the door. One hand over his chest, the other and his leg halfway off the couch. He'd probably fallen off and Carl couldn't lift his full weight back on. Half of his right eye drooped. His face was mostly red, bruised, cut, covered in coagulated, scabbing blood. His shirt was practically threads, and the evening light hitting his bare skin revealed a blotch of purple covering his upper torso.

"Looks like he's got a couple of bruised ribs…" my eyes trailed down. There was a bullet hole and a piece of cloth wrapped around his thigh. I felt the underside. Just a through-and-through, thank god, and no bleeding.

"But he took care of that leg wound well enough. I'll probably have to clean it and some of his cuts but that can wait 'till morning. He needs the rest more than anything right now."

Carl let out an uneasy breath.

"Hey," I whispered gently. He looked back to me

"He's gonna be okay, and I'm not going anywhere."

He nodded.

"I'll take the chair, if you want to sleep on the cushions." He offered, "You don't look so good yourself."

I un-shouldered my bag and slumped down into the soft armchair, propping my axe up in front of it and curling my legs up to my chest.

"No, I'm fine here. You need it way more than I do."

He resigned to my wishes and went over to his scrounged up mattress in the other corner of the room, and whispered his goodnights which I returned.

I continued watching that sliver of moonlight hit his strong, peacefully sleeping face, highlighting the rise and fall of his chest. And to think, I was about put a bullet in my own brain. He'd probably tell me that divine intervention had something to do with that. Just because I'd believe him this time doesn't mean that I wouldn't debate with him about it eventually.

And that was something I was looking forward to.